Child of the Wind, Son of the Fire
by Demetria0620
Summary: AU: Gaara was brought by his uncle to seek refuge in Konoha after that failed assassination attempt. After Yashamaru's death in the war to retrieve him, he was adopted by the Yondaime Hokage. A sort of crack-ish AU family bonding between Gaara-Minato-Naruto (aka Konoha!Gaara).
1. Chapter 1

Sleep terrified him senseless.

The fear—this irrational fear towards the most basic of human needs—used to come from the demon within him, because falling asleep was Shukaku's one-way-ticket to the funland of mass slaughter and bloodthirsty rampage.

But the strange warmth of the new seal on his chest has bound the demon into submission, allowing him the same luxury that his loudly snoring brother has. He could fall asleep without worries now.

The first time falling asleep was a strange experience. He has been anticipating nightmares—to be haunted by his previous victims in the strange land of dreams seemed appropriate considering that something bad needed to happen to balance out these good things that he has lucked out—but to his surprise, it was a fitful dreamless sleep.

It was nice. It felt so good.

Gaara loves bedtime.

However, it didn't negate his fear of waking up to the heat of the desert sun instead of this humid warmth he now has called home.

He didn't want to wake up from this wonderful dream.

Thus, Gaara remained awake.

* * *

 **A/N: This AU is created to sate my imagination of "What will happen if Minato survived and adopted Gaara before the hate could even get to the poor boy?" Their characters might be different due to the different living circumstances they had in this AU.**

 **I just want some Minato-Naruto-Gaara family bonding, okay? Especially a Father-Son bonding between Minato and Gaara.**


	2. Chapter 2

"No."

Gaara looked up to the adult, wondering if the stress from work has gotten to the man. Like, why else would the man thought that holding the bottle above his head would stop Sabaku no Gaara from getting what he wanted? Honestly, Gaara was not a normal child, what even Yondaime-sama was thinking?

"I need it," Gaara said, voice flat and emotionless as he stretched his tiny hand up to give the man the illusion that his endearingly futile attempt was working on Gaara. " _Please_. I need that."

Maybe some manners would soften the man.

Gaara pretended not to see the twitch at the corner of those vibrant blue eyes—a tattle-tale sign of incoming lecture.

Not that it would waver him anyway. He survived the cold glare of the murderous man he had to call father after all. Thus, the incoming nagging from _this_ Yondaime-sama was nothing compared to that.

It was way too early in the morning to be nagged, but at least that was the worse he would receive here.

Gaara would take early-morning-nagging anytime. At least it was an upgrade compared to assassination attempts.

"No," the man growled, swatting the tendril of sand behind him with the ladle in his hand, not even removing his gaze from the stubborn boy in front of him. "You're a growing child. Too much energy drink will stunt your growth and rot your teeth."

Gaara refused to admit that he found Mama Yondaime endearingly cute.

It was frustrating as hell when his own sand seemed to know not to mess with this man as the tendril of sand slowly retreated back into the tiny gourd strapped on Gaara's back. Geez, what a lousy traitor his sand was.

"Minato-sama—" Gaara tried again.

"No," the Yondaime Hokage waved him off, thrusting a full glass of warm milk into his hands instead. "Drink that, eat your breakfast and go back to bed. I'll inform Iruka that you will be absent today."

Gaara stared into the warm beverage in his hands, lips pursed tightly.

"Is that an order, Hokage-sama?"

Minato stiffened, and Gaara almost felt bad upon noticing the forlorn expression on the man's face. It was a dirty trick on Gaara's part. Minato would never order his children around, unless if it was to protect them during extremely dangerous situations.

(Or to help him with the house chores, but those orders were mostly for Naruto. Gaara was fine doing the house chores, but Naruto didn't have the attention span needed for it.)

The point was, pulling this card against Minato was a dirty move from Gaara considering that ever since Yashamaru died and the Hokage took Gaara into this household, the man has made an obvious effort to not resemble anything like the _other_ Yondaime Kage Gaara has known.

Thus, they remained in that thick suffocating silence.

Minato seemed to be calculating and pondering on his next moves, while Gaara waited for the man to snap and lash out at him like how a normal person would be. There should be an end to all these kindness and goodness that Gaara has been receiving. Having the Hokage to end his good luck seemed appropriate because it was the man himself who has bestowed this to Gaara years ago.

Good things didn't last. Let this be over before its loss could hurt Gaara even more.

"Look, Gaara-kun…"

"Was that an order, Hokage-sama?"

Minato exhaled a long deep breath as they returned to the silence.

Gaara didn't know why he tested the Hokage's patience like this. Was it based on some self-preservation needs of his instincts to prove that this man was simply another power-hungry leader who only wanted him as a weapon? Gaara himself didn't know of his own reasonings.

However, Minato was the Yondaime Hokage after all. Surely there wasn't much difference between Yondaime _Hokage_ and Yondaime _Kazekage_.

This man also sealed a tailed beast inside his own son.

Though, he protected that son. He showered Naruto with love that the boy was practically drowning in it while Gaara simmered with envy in the background—at least until the attention was turned onto him and then _he_ had to struggle to **_not_** love this man.

But Minato-sama sealed Kyuubi inside Naruto. Just like Kazekage-sama sealed Shukaku inside Gaara.

 _He is the same…_

Gaara didn't know if that was Shukaku or his own thought. Though, one thing he was sure of—the Hokage was not to be trusted.

There were a few times that Gaara thought the Hokage would finally lash out, because despite being a child as he was, Gaara was perspective enough to notice the way the man trembled. The Hokage was trembling so bad that he has to lean against the wall for support. Surely Hokage-sama must have been so angry that he needed the wall for support, right?

But the lashing never came.

The thick silence was only broken with a loud yawn as the yellow tuft of Gaara's supposedly new brother trudged sleepily into the dining room.

"Haaa….what are you two doing so early in the morning?"

Gaara considered to affectionately crush Naruto for the amazing timing.

He did not know that the Hokage was considering the exact same thing.

* * *

 **A/N : We all know that Minato is a wonderful housewife. ╲( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)╱**


	3. Chapter 3

"Konoha is weird, uncle."

Gaara wasn't expecting any reply, but the soft wind that tickled his cheek gave him an illusion that his uncle was laughing at his words. Yashamaru did that often enough, especially during their first months here in Konoha. That happy period of time of which Gaara couldn't get the culture shock out of his system quick enough to not have his uncle laughing at his commentary on their new home. Gaara cracked another smile at the memories—it has been increasingly easy to do now—and leant his back against the gravestone, basking underneath the glow of the full moon.

Once upon a time, he used to dread nights like this, because he knew that it would end with innocent blood on his hands. But now Shukaku was merely a purring presence deep within his chest. The demon was calm and at ease, no longer demanding blood or violence.

It was both relieving and terrifying—this sudden peace of his demon—but Gaara was not going to complain.

He spent the next 30 minutes talking to his uncle's grave, regaling his day at the academy—Naruto's shenanigan and the utter exasperation of both Minato and Iruka once Naruto was caught were something that Gaara thought Yashamaru would appreciate—before he finally took his leave. He has snuck out after he felt Minato's wheezing breath eased up to peaceful sleep, but he should return soon since the Hokage has a habit of randomly waking up in the night.

Minato also has the habit of obsessively worrying over his children.

Therefore, Gaara should be in his bed, just in case if the man woke up. He was not supposed to worry his carer after all.

For the time being, he felt nothing from his sand in Minato's room but the peaceful vibration of deep slumber, so Gaara felt no need to rush. He patted Yashamaru's gravestone for one last time and left the smaller bouquet of flower on his uncle's grave. He always brought two bouquets during his nightly visits—one small and one large. Gaara then undid the larger bouquet, satisfied that they were still fresh and nice as he left a flower on each grave of the shinobi who did not hesitate to defend an outsider like him.

He often wondered why the people of Konoha were so nice.

Common sense would indicate that it was wise to just give him up to his father before any bloodshed happens.

Apparently, common sense did not exist in half of the village and most of the higher-ups of Konoha's ruling power—specifically, the current Hokage and his predecessor.

Not that the opposing group has any counters when they all knew that Gaara was going to be killed so that Shukaku could be transferred to a more stable host. People would be seriously questioning their morality if they did that.

In Konoha, the sense of morality overruled common sense.

They didn't suffer much loss in that mini war, and to be honest, back then, Gaara didn't even care. He just assumed that these people only wanted to keep him because of his power. Why else would you sacrifice your people to protect an outsider child? But, since Yashamaru said that Konoha was safer for both of them, he didn't put up any protest but instead indulge Shukaku's bloodlust by feeding him the blood of his own kinsmen in order to protect Konoha's shinobi that was fighting for him.

Imagine his confusion when the Hokage lectured him for going into the battle without any regards of his own safety.

Or the utter mindfuck that he felt when he discovered Naruto, who was a jinchuuriki just like him—and probably much stronger too considering that Kyuubi has 9 tails—but has never once been made to think of himself as a weapon.

Not to mention the extremely specific orders from the Hokage that Gaara was not to be treated any different than children of his age—which would mean more playing and zero lessons on mercilessly murdering his enemies.

It was strange, but Gaara adapted to his new life situation without complaint.

After his few years growing up in Konoha's warm care, the guilt eventually grew within him. Most of these people genuinely worry over his fate, without any ulterior motives. He knew that there were people within Konoha's political hierarchy who wanted his power for unsavoury reasons, but they were overshadowed by the large group of people who were simply happy that Gaara was not killed by his own father.

Apparently, to normal people, that was an unacceptable crime—to kill one's own child.

Thus, in sleepless nights like this, Gaara spent his time talking to the graves of his uncle and the shinobi that has fallen to keep him alive. He knew that some of them have families, and he may or may not has scattered his sand in their houses to keep watch of their safety, but what else he could do? He couldn't reverse the time and remain in Suna so that these people won't die for his sake.

He patted the last gravestone, murmuring to the dead man beneath it that his daughter has gotten the perfect score again—Akane was his classmate in the academy and he has vowed to keep an eye on her safety as gratitude for his sacrifice—and that he should be proud because there was no doubt that she was going to be a strong kunoichi in the future.

The wind that breezed past his cheek was almost too warm for the cold night.

Gaara looked down at the remaining flowers, pondered for a bit before he divided the bouquet into two smaller ones. He left one bouquet at the great memorial stone of Konoha's past warriors.

He left the other on Kushina's grave.

"Thank you," he murmured softly, not even knowing why he would say that.

This time, the warm breeze embraced him.

* * *

 **A/N: Kushina totally cuddled him from the afterlife. lol**

 **By the way, this AU is a procrastination method of mine. It is not supposed to be long as I originally planned it to be one super-long one shot...but then I got lazy.**


	4. Chapter 4

Gaara loves his teddy bear.

He was probably too old to be attached to a soft toy, but Minato didn't say anything against it, so Gaara considered that it was not wrong. Plus, Akane's older sister still sleep with her teddy bear, and she was 20-ish something. Perhaps in Konoha, the age limit to cuddle a soft toy was set to a much older age than it was in Suna.

Not that Gaara was going to let anyone took his teddy bear away from him.

It was the only thing he has left that was originally from Suna, now that Yashamaru was dead and Gaara has outgrown his desert clothes. As much as it pained him to remember the scorns he received from his birthplace, there were good things of Suna that he regretted to abandon.

Having Naruto as a brother made him realised that perhaps he did love his biological siblings. It was too bad that he fell into his father's game and let the fear and distrust overshadowed their love and turned them against each other.

Gaara squeezed his teddy bear to his chest.

The Kazekage was a definite lost cause, but was it the same for Temari and Kankurou?

"Temari," he murmured to the still wind outside his open window. "Kankurou," he whimpered to the soft fabric of the teddy bear.

At times like this, Gaara appreciated Minato's lenient parenting. He could cry without the worries of being punished.

Thus, he cried. His sand moved to shield him—a protective sturdy ball of privacy. Within the darkness, Gaara cried and poured his sorrow out. He mourned over his uncle. He grieved the loss of his own blood siblings. He let his tears raged over the love his own father has destroyed. He cried until his chest heaved with effort, and his eyes were so warm it _hurts_.

He belatedly realised that he was not alone when he felt the bed dipped outside of his little ball.

"Hey," cue the soft hesitant greeting.

It was Naruto.

Gaara squeezed his eyes tight. Of course, it would be Naruto. They were only separated by a wall after all. Minato was out on an important Hokage errand and the ANBU outside were _not_ supposed to be seen or heard unless there was someone foolish enough to try attacking them. Who else would approach him with kindness like this if it was not Naruto?

Gaara considered to undo his sand ball but then realised that he would probably have puffy eyes and it would be embarrassing to be seen like this. Not trusting his own voice, Gaara carved out words on his sand, telling Naruto that he was fine, and Naruto could go back to sleep.

He should've known better that Naruto was incredibly stubborn.

"I'm sleeping here."

With that, Gaara felt the bed dipped even more as the vibration of Naruto's breathing evened out. He could pick up Naruto's heartbeats, so close and calm—a definite contrast to how Kankurou and Temari were the last time he was allowed to meet them.

Back then, they needed to be under strict supervision to even meet each other.

Gaara remembered the way the guard team shielded Temari and Kankurou when Gaara tried to reach out to hug them. The tension in those trained bodies and the confused fear in his siblings' eyes were enough to make Gaara stopped reaching out again.

It was painful.

Gaara squeezed his teddy bear tighter to his chest.

"Gaara," Naruto's voice was hesitant, sounding so small and unsure all of sudden.

Gaara carved out large words on his sand demanding to be left alone, hoping so hard that Naruto will yield to his request this time.

Instead of leaving, Naruto exhaled a long deep breath and went silent for a considerably long moment.

Gaara braced himself for the hurl of painful words reprimanding him of how much of an ungrateful brat he was being.

However, to his surprise, he felt a shift on his sand, the small familiar weight of his adoptive brother spread around his protective sand as if Naruto was hugging Gaara's shield. Curious, Gaara cracked open an opening to poke his head out, only to be surprised when Naruto took that chance to squeeze himself into the protective ball.

"Got you," the blonde boy giggled, stunning Gaara in pleasant shock when Naruto squished him into a tight embrace.

"Why?"

"As if I would leave you alone, idiot," the words came with a brush of warm breath on top of Gaara's hair, successfully stopping Gaara's attempt to struggle free.

Gaara couldn't help but treasure that little warmth.

And just like that, he _melted_ into Naruto's embrace, letting his brother showered him with siblings touch he was denied before. All the cuddles and kisses that Temari and Kankuro were prohibited from giving him were now being compensated by Naruto.

They eventually ended up tangled and curled against each other, Gaara's sand curved on top of them like a protective dome that shielded them from everything outside.

It was dark inside the dome, but Naruto's peaceful breathing was a delightful sound within the darkness. The warmth of his small body was a comforting presence wrapped around Gaara's own. The teddy bear was permanently crushed between his and Naruto's chests, but Gaara didn't care. He wanted _this_.

Thus, he tentatively reached out his arms to return the hug.

He could _feel_ Naruto's smile growing. The hug instantly tightened.

His lips quirked to a smile too.

Easy as it was, he let Naruto's warmth lulled him into a dreamless sleep.

When he woke, Naruto was still snoring, spread out like a starfish with one of his arms beneath Gaara's head. It was probably still early morning, judging from the lack of natural warmth of Konoha's sun. Not that it was surprising, considering that despite having the privilege of falling asleep now, Gaara was simply so used to not sleep that he only managed to sleep for one or two hours per day. Minato has suggested that he tried taking naps in specific intervals, but Gaara has yet to experiment that.

It did leave him with a considerable amount of waking time—not as much as it used to be, but still plenty.

Knowing that trying to fall back to sleep was futile, Gaara cracked the dome open, letting his sand disintegrated and returned to his gourd. He stretched his limbs, planning to spend the rest of time he had left until sunrise to take advantage of Naruto's natural tendency to switch between being a starfish or an octopus.

That was until he realised the additional set of breathing in the room.

His sand lashed out first, doing multiple things at the same time on pure instinct. It formed a protective dome around Naruto first, while some of them slithered outside, trying to pick up the signs of the ANBU outside as the remaining sand prepared for the incoming assault—all were automatic reactions as his sleep-addled mind attempted to catch up with the current situation.

One of the disadvantages of this new privilege of falling asleep was the _grogginess_. It delayed his mind.

His sand detected quickened heartbeats outside, but the weight was the familiar weights of the agents Minato usually dispatched as their guards. Confused and completely baffled, Gaara risked shifting his focus to the window—frantically checking the vibrations of their heartbeats and the pace of their controlled breathing.

They didn't feel like they were injured though, just… _nervous_.

Blinking the grogginess away, Gaara shifted his gaze from the window towards the source of his panic, only to deflate and instantly retracted his sand back into the gourd.

It would be difficult to explain this if Minato decided to wake up right now.

How did the Hokage manage to sneak past Gaara's sand anyway? There should at least some vibrations that Gaara should've picked up.

The Hokage has taken up the little free spot at the end of the bed, his back was against the wall and cushioned with a pillow, legs stretched across the bed with his feet hanging just at the edge. His face was a splitting image of his son, only with more dignity and less drool.

Now awake enough to assess the situation, Gaara finally noticed the white coat draped over his chair and wondered if the man straight up searched for his children the moment he returned from his duties.

It warmed the hurting spot in his chest, soothing the pain away.

When Minato groggily opened those vibrant blue eyes and gave the boy a sleepy smile, Gaara wondered about the reasons his body was flooded with warmth.

When the Hokage picked him up before trudging back sleepily to the bed, Gaara wondered if Kankurou and Temari have this experience too.

When Minato flopped back onto the bed and cradled both children to his chest, Gaara wondered if this was the father Rasa would be if things were normal.

When Minato kissed his forehead before falling back to sleep completely unguarded, Gaara wondered if this was how it felt to finally started healing.

So many questions whose answers Gaara wasn't sure of. Was he overthinking things? Or was this the result of his grievance towards his lost blood family? Gaara wasn't sure.

Though, there was one thing that Gaara was sure of.

The spot in his chest didn't hurt.

* * *

 **A/N: Kakashi was definitely one of the ANBU outside. That's why they didn't instantly spring into action when Gaara lashed out.**


	5. Chapter 5

"Are those from the Yamanaka's?"

Gaara barely restrained his sand from lashing out of surprise. He has started to reduce his dependence on his sand since the last training with his babysitter. After defeating both him and Naruto senseless, the Anbu-slash-babysitter pointed out something that has never crossed Gaara's mind before. Gaara's senses were mostly dulled due to his constant reliance on his sand. It brought for a worrying concern to him. There was no guarantee that he won't came across a situation that would inhibit his sand, therefore he thought he needed to practice using his other senses too.

And true to what his babysitter said, his senses were extremely dull. He definitely did not notice her approaching him.

"Akane-san," Gaara relaxed his posture before turning around, quirking a tiny smile towards his classmate.

"Gaara-kun," she greeted with a smile.

"Uh…," he started, fidgeting slightly. "Fancy seeing you here."

"I'm just passing by," Akane beamed. Her eyes gazed past his shoulder to stare at the flower he just left on the grave and she promptly gave him a grateful bow. "Thank you for visiting my father."

Gaara nodded, retreating into respectful silence as he stepped aside to allow her access to the grave. He wasn't expecting any company, considering that people usually visit the graveyard during the daytime. It may not as late as his usual visits, but the moon was out and most people either were at the town square or in the comfort of their home at this time of the night.

"Hello, Otou-san," he heard her soft greeting and suddenly felt that he has invaded a private moment. "It has been a long time, right? I'm sorry. I'm busy studying."

Gaara quickly retreated away and headed towards Yashamaru's grave, silently letting his sand did the cleaning for him this time. He usually cleaned the graves of the fallen shinobi with his own hands, but tonight was not the time to indulge in his graveyard routine. Instead, he focused on the sounds of the night to stop himself from unintentionally eavesdropping on her conversation with her father's gravestone.

If he closed his eyes, the movement of the wind almost reminded him of Temari.

If he listened closely, the clicking of the crickets almost reminded him of Kankurou.

"I hope both of you are doing well….," he breathed out, willing his mind returned to that one time he got to play with his siblings.

He huffed a small chuckle. In his memories, Kankurou was so bright and silly while Temari was so easily annoyed and awed at both of his little brothers. He remembered the way Temari's face lit up in awe when she saw the sandcastle that he built. He remembered Kankurou's excitement and the way his face brightened up when Gaara entertained his request for sand figures.

The sandcastle. The variety of food. The pile of poop.

Kankurou has the weirdest requests.

But that's why Gaara loved him.

In a way, Kankurou was like Naruto—a bright presence in his life with just the right amount of mischief and silliness.

There was no doubt that between two of his elder siblings, Kankurou was the one who used to be more active in trying to reach out to Gaara. Temari was more reserved, moreover with Rasa's menacing influence hovering behind her. But there was never a doubt that at least in their early childhood, Gaara loved his siblings dearly, and he was sure that the feeling was reciprocated too.

The longing suddenly felt too much to handle, so Gaara tentatively created a tiny figurine of his brother and sister, letting the sand figure floated on his palm.

How would they look like right now? The memory he has on them was from so long ago. Surely they have grown and changed, right? Would Temari still keep her hairstyle? Or would she choose a different hairstyle that is more suited to her age? Would Kankurou grow taller, or would he remain stout and sturdy? Would he continue his path on being a puppeteer? Or would he yield to Rasa's demands for him to master the family's kekkei genkai since he was the next in line to be the Kazekage?

The sand on his palm shifted, reshaping the figures to a much older version of his brother and sister. Gaara smiled at them as if these tiny figures on his palm was his actual siblings.

Heat pricked his eyes when the figures smiled and waved at him.

"I didn't know you could do that."

The figures vanished as sand slipped down his palm onto the ground.

When has she moved to stand behind him? Geez, no wonder Kakashi-no-niisan roasted him for having dull senses without his sand.

"Did I surprise you?" Akane giggled, smoothening the fabrics of her skirts as she squatted beside him. "I don't know that it is possible to catch you off-guard. You're always so good during our classes."

"Thank…you?"

Gaara could almost hear Minato's teasing laughter and Naruto's exasperated sigh at his awkward response. Akane didn't seem to mind his awkwardness though since she didn't laugh or tease him. Instead, she left a stalk of flower on Yashamaru's grave, eyes fluttering shut as she muttered prayers under her breath.

Gaara watched her silently, concealing his surprise perfectly. He didn't expect a native Konoha to pray for a Suna shinobi that has done nothing but brought troubles and strains into their peaceful village. _Especially_ the people who have lost someone because of Gaara.

"That is nice of you…," Gaara commented once she has done with her prayers.

"Not as nice as you," she returned, practically beaming at him.

"Huh?"

Gaara was pretty sure he was on the top 3 cold assholes in the academy, probably on the second place right behind Sasuke. He literally shadowed Naruto everywhere and didn't communicate much with his peers. The closest friends he had were Chouji and Shikamaru—and that was because they were friends with Naruto.

How does one relate with other kids anyway?

They talked about things they liked, but no one seemed to share his interest in sand sculpting or idolising the same figure as he was. It was not his fault that he preferred to idolise genius historical figure instead of other more common famous people.

It was so difficult to connect with other kids without having Naruto's influence around.

This was the first time one of his classmates complimented him like this.

Akane pressed her knuckles to her lips, stiffening a giggle, apparently already picking up on his confusion. "I stopped by here after school," she explained, gesturing towards her father's grave. "And I often saw the flowers you left. The graveyard is always clean too ever since the flowers started turning up."

"Oh…," Gaara mumbled, averting his gaze to the moment. "I have lots of free time."

Her gaze flickered just briefly towards his gourd before returning to his face. "Thank you again," she murmured, smiling tentatively. "I'm pretty sure they all are grateful that you're taking care of their resting place."

Gaara's gaze flitted towards the lines of gravestones, his lips automatically quirked to a tiny smile. He gripped the remaining sand in his palm till the grains felt hot against his skin and _remembered_.

"I'm the one that should be grateful," he sighed, opening his palm like an offering to the moon.

Somewhere, he knew that Temari and Kankurou were looking at the very same moon too.

As if it understood him, the wind blew his sand away.

* * *

 **A/N: I love the sand-siblings relationship. Also, I had to introduce more of Akane because having 2 jinchuuriki in one genin team is a complete overkill. Not to mention that it would cause Kakashi to grow grey early** — **oh wait.**


	6. Chapter 6

"You know, I'm expecting to deal with the late-night-sneaking in a few more years."

Gaara froze on his window-sill, honestly not expecting to be caught red-handed like this. Minato was supposedly to be _asleep_. Gaara has even spread out his sand around to alert him should the Hokage woke up.

But then again, was he really going to outsmart _the_ Hokage?

Gaara lifted his head to meet the unamused gaze of the Hokage. Minato was casually leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest with a rather smug smirk on his face as the man nodded at the sand clone that was kneeling in shame by the bed.

And he thought he has perfected the art of sand clone. Did his traitorous sand betray him again?

"Sorry," Gaara mumbled, disintegrating his clone and closed the window behind him before he faced the Hokage, honestly expecting a reprimand.

He wasn't expecting the heavy, warm hand that landed on his head and was currently messing with his hair.

It felt… _nice_.

"I have some tea downstairs," Minato said after he has given Gaara an eternal bedhead hair. "I'd love it if you join me."

It was an unspoken order, so Gaara wordlessly trailed behind the man.

They reached the kitchen without speaking, thus making Gaara wondered if Minato was more exhausted than he initially thought. He checked the vibration on his sand just to be sure and determined that yes, the man was indeed exhausted—which made him internally cringed in guilt. Despite the lingering doubts and distrusts that Gaara still held against the older man, a part of him acknowledged the sense of safety and love he relished on around Minato. Feelings are complicated.

Minato cracked a tiny smile at the way Gaara awkwardly stood in the room and jerked his head towards the stool by the counter, motioning the boy to sit while he prepared the tea. It seemed that he was already halfway through that task, as it only took a few seconds for the Hokage to add the tea leaves into the steaming pot before serving the drink to the waiting boy.

Gaara remained silent as Minato poured the tea for both of them, keeping his gaze on the swirls and pattern of the wooden counter.

He only lifted his head when the tea was placed in front of him, watching the lines of stress disappeared from the Hokage's pale face as the older man sipped on his own tea.

"So," Minato started, resting his cup on the counter but kept his hands cupped around the ceramic, directly in Gaara's line of sight. "Do you still have trouble sleeping?"

Gaara fleetingly wondered if that was a display of vulnerability on the Hokage's part, to show Gaara that he wasn't doing anything suspicious with his hands. However, the boy didn't ponder too long on that thought, focusing on the question presented to him instead.

"Not exactly," he responded, voice barely audible.

Minato cocked an eyebrow, looking like a splitting image of Naruto whenever the boy was confused with their lesson. Though, the man remained silent, as if waiting for more explanation.

"I'm not used to sleep," Gaara settled for the simplest explanation. "So I settled for naps like you suggested instead of full night sleep."

It was more than that, but he wasn't going to elaborate because Minato was going to listen until the very end, and Gaara knew better that the man needed some sleep. Geez, his sand could pick up Minato's ragged breathing and fast heartbeats, despite the perfectly normal act the man tried to put up.

"Ah," Minato breathed out, tipping his head slightly to the side. "So the seal is still working…? Shukaku is not acting up?"

"He is being…," Gaara pondered for the right word before settling with one, "… oddly _calm_."

Understatement of the year.

Gaara's eyes widened when Minato let out a relieved breath. The man visibly deflated, slouching tiredly on the counter, face buried in his arms.

 _I knew it_.

He knew that hoping for a loving parent would be asking too much. His own father could not love him, how was he supposed to expect the leader of a supposed enemy village to genuinely love him? Minato's acting was perfect up until now—

"That's great," the Hokage rambled, seemingly so relieved. "For a moment I thought that the seal is acting up and you're suffering in silence."

 _What_.

"You're not worried that I'm going to snap and hurt your people?" those words escaped his lips faster than Gaara could think.

Somewhere deep within his chest, Gaara could feel Shukaku snorted.

"Why would I think that?" That blunt deadpan came faster than a literal heartbeat.

Oh, for the love of Kami-sama, did the Hokage just used the innocent blinking eyes no jutsu on him? Did he not realise how dangerous Gaara could be? Or was he looking down on Gaara? That was extremely foolish, even for a goofball of a Hokage he was.

 _Or he genuinely love you to not see you as a threat._

Damn Konoha and their magic. Gaara used to only deal with Shukaku's oppressing voice. Now that Shukaku was oddly silent, he was arguing with his own contrasting inner voice. What even was wrong with this village?

"You know very well that I'm a monster," Gaara growled, but mainly in frustration. "I can hurt your people. I _am_ behaving but _accidents_ can happen."

Minato blinked infuriatingly slow—as if he was sleepy and was trying to remain awake—before the infamous Yondaime Hokage's million-megawatt smile spread across his face. He reached a hand across the counter to ruffle Gaara's hair again, successfully subduing the boy's frustrated tantrum.

"I know you can," the Hokage stated matter-of-factly. "I also acknowledge that accidents can happen if your control slip. I would be a fool if I considered otherwise," he added with a sigh. "But that doesn't mean that you're a monster."

Gaara was about to retort when he felt the Hokage's warm palm pressed on his cheek, the battle-coarse thumb traced the dark rings underneath his eyes. It was a simple gesture but was distinctly foreign to the boy. It was nothing more intimate than the hugs and cuddles he has started to get used to, but it felt _different_. It felt like it worth so much _more_. The gesture invoked an automatic response as Gaara's body moved on its own, smaller hands grasped the Hokage's wrist to keep the warmth in place.

"You're no monster, Gaara," Minato said, not resisting the tight grasp on his wrist.

In fact, it was something that he appreciated, considering that this was the first time he had intimate contact with his adoptive son. Up until this point, Gaara only allowed Minato to ruffle his hair. The occasional cuddles was a privilege that would be granted when the boy thought that Minato was too tired or half-asleep. It was like the boy has an issue with accepting affectionate gestures from adults, thus the reason that the main privilege of hugs and cuddles seemingly went to Naruto.

Not that Minato was going to blame his boy—Naruto was incredibly cuddly, after all.

How many years has it been that he promised the boy's uncle that he was going to look after Gaara like his own?

It has been a long wait.

"But—"

Minato hushed the boy's incoming retort by risking a forehead kiss. It seemed to stunt Gaara into some form of disbelieving gaze, the pale green eyes looked up into his own with painfully young wonders, as if the boy thought that the affectionate gesture was a fluke of his imagination. Minato's mind unwillingly reeled back to the conversation he had with Yashamaru—back then when he was still pondering the fate of the Suna duo—and he had to hold back his anger from lashing out.

He remembered the verbal abuse his own people directed towards his own son, despite the fact that Minato was still here—breathing and alive and would very much willing to turn the world upside down for his boy—his position as the supposedly unbiased Hokage be damned.

They blamed his innocent boy for the destruction that Kyuubi has caused to the village. They blamed Naruto for his current state, despite it was the unexpected battle against the student he thought has long dead that has wrecked Minato's body to this state.

It was easy for the people to blame the hosts of literal monsters.

But, none of these children were monsters.

"Gaara," he murmured, pressing his lips on top of the tuft of vibrant red hair that painfully reminded him of his own deceased wife.

Minato almost believed that he had a heart attack right after _that_ realisation dawned onto him.

"Minato-san…?"

It was an awkward strain to stretch over the counter like this, but Minato wasn't sure if the boy would allow this to repeat if he let go for the sake of being comfortable now. The realisation was… _enlightening_. He could add Gaara into the family picture frame, at the empty space on the left of his wedding picture and no one would question that the boy was theirs at the first glance. He fleetingly wondered how Kushina would bond with the boy if she was alive now.

Probably the same way she bonded with Obito—a lot of nagging in front of them but behind the kids, she will talk about them with joyous pride.

"You're not a monster," Minato repeated, wrapping his other arm around the boy's shoulder.

This was his boy too. Naruto was not a monster, so neither was Gaara.

"Sir, you're delusional—"

"Monsters are not children who have no idea to control the power inside them," the Hokage started, successfully silencing the trembling boy. "Monsters are not the beasts that are hunted by humans who lusted for their power," he added, barely concealing his shock when he felt Shukaku's chakra leaked out.

It was as if the beast was tempted to listen too.

"Minato-san?" Gaara was positively squeaking, terrified senseless when he felt Shukaku stirred within him.

He tried to break free, not wanting one of the kindest men he has ever met to be in murder range when Shukaku was fully out.

To his utter panic and frustration, it was impossible to break free from Minato without hurting the man first.

"Real monsters, my boy…," there was a pause, and Gaara saw the way Minato's throat bobbed as if he just swallowed something unpleasant.

Gaara braced himself for the painful truth.

It never came.

"Real monsters are fathers who sealed dangerous beasts into their innocent infants," the man's voice was notably scratchy when he spoke, but his strength did not yield to Gaara's resistance. "Real monsters are fathers who let their innocent children been victimized despite having the ability to protect them," he burrowed his face into the messy red hair, inhaling shakily. "Real monsters are husbands who let his wife died alone," he whimpered, internally begging forgiveness from the wife he left to die alone while he chose to save his astray former student. "Real monsters are teachers who let his young students died. Real monsters are the leaders who sent his people to death for his own selfish reasons…"

Minato was too close that Gaara could feel each ragged breath of the older man and the spasm of the much bigger body against his smaller one. It was an extremely pathetic display of trust and vulnerability that Gaara could've cried in disbelief.

Yondaime Kazekage would never show this kind of weakness in front of the monster who could easily kill him.

 ** _"But he is not Yondaime_ _Kazekage_ _is he?"_**

The boy had to wonder what game his demon was playing. This was not the normal behaviour of Shukaku.

 ** _"And how do you even know what is 'normal behaviour' for me, brat?"_**

Gaara has no retort for that.

"You're no monster, my boy," Minato's gentle kiss on his forehead brought Gaara's attention back to the present. "You have never been a monster and never will be."

Gaara has no retort for that either.

* * *

 **A/N: A little bit heavier this time. But, my gluttony for Minato-Gaara bonding is satisfied. And I believe you can already guess who else would be on the genin team with Gaara and Akane. Like I said in the previous chapter, 2 jinchuuriki in one team along with an Uchiha and Kakashi would be an overkill. Gaara could not be on the same team as Naruto.**


	7. Chapter 7

"Hmmm…"

Gaara kept his focus fixed on his sand, pretending to not notice the rather distracting presence on his table.

"Hmmmmmmmmmm…"

The heavy blob wobbled a bit but slowly formed into the shape that he intended. Gaara smiled at the improvement.

"Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm…."

Ignore him. Ignore him. Focus on the sand. Focus on the sand. Focus on the sa—

"Ha, I get it now!" Naruto's voice boomed directly to his ear causing Gaara to instantly lost his focus.

The sand crumbled into a sad wet lump on the table.

"You're trying to overcome your weakness!" Naruto cheered, completely ignoring their bewildered classmates as he bounced on the tables, index finger pointing towards Gaara.

Gaara didn't even feel guilty when he directed his sand to swat Naruto's head, causing the blonde boy to topple off the table. Naruto totally deserved that one.

Though, the commotion ended up attracting the attention of their classmates. _Naturally_.

The Hokage's son and his foreign adoptive brother _always_ get the attention.

"Gaaaaraaaa…. That's so mean," Naruto whined, rubbing his head with the sulky pout that Gaara has grown immune to was etched on his face. "I'm just commenting."

"You're disrupting my concentration," Gaara deadpanned, returning his gaze to the pile of wet sand he has been working on ever since Iruka left them for the self-study session. "Go and do your homework, Naruto."

"But homework should be done at _home_."

Gaara resisted the urge to argue. He facepalmed and exhaled a deep long breath, now completely pretending to be deaf. The girls at the opposite side were already giggling at them, and somewhere from the back of the class, he could hear Shikamaru's lazy voice commenting on the disruption of his naptime and Sasuke's huff of distaste.

If they caused any bigger commotion than this, Iruka will come running to yell at them.

Though, Naruto apparently has taken a deep interest in Gaara's project as he climbed back to sit on the table, arms crossed and eyes narrowed towards the pile of wet sand.

"You know that I'll always have your back, right?" Naruto murmured, just loud enough for Gaara to hear, but not enough to be heard by the leaning busybodies who were attempting to eavesdrop on them.

"I know," Gaara murmured back, hovering his palm over the sand in another attempt to shape them. "I'll have your back too," he huffed. "But that doesn't mean I shouldn't try to overcome my weaknesses."

"It gets so heavy, huh…?" Naruto mused, stealing a pinch of sand and rolled it between his fingers. "But hey! It felt sturdy…"

"It takes too much energy to maintain," Gaara added, forming two perfect little balls of sand using both dry and wet sand. "Look," he offered his palms to Naruto, showing the hovering spheres. The wet sand hovered much lower than the dry one. "I used the same amount of chakra and energy for both of them."

Naruto poked the wet sand sphere, only to jerk his finger back when the ball cracked and crumbled to a pile of wet sand.

"Ehhhh," he crowed, half-fascinated and half-awed. "That is so fragile!"

Gaara nodded, agreeing with the observation. For some unknown reasons, he couldn't maintain the same sturdiness of his dry sand to the wet. With this kind of weakness, water-style shinobi will have a field trip fighting him. Gaara let out a soft sigh and let the sand fell onto the table.

It was then that he realised that his classmates have been circling him all the time—they were obviously trying to get a closer look without invading his personal space. When they met his gaze, some averted their eyes while the rest were showing a varied degree of embarrassment of being caught eavesdropping.

Gaara made eye-contact with Akane, who shrugged sheepishly at him.

"You have never used your sand outside training classes," Ino offered as an explanation, Sakura nodding furiously behind her. "So…we're kinda curious…"

He then couldn't help but resist a chuckle upon noticing that some of the boys have been paying attention to him too. Sasuke's face was half-hidden behind his book, but the speed he quickly averted his gaze upon being caught sneaking glances at Gaara was hilarious. Taiko was sneaking glances at him too, but he only gave Gaara a shy wave when their eyes met. Chouji was one of the boys who has stood directly at the edge of Gaara's table, with Shikamaru yawning in boredom behind him. At the back of the class, Shino didn't even move from his seat, but Gaara noticed the insect at the corner of his table.

His lips spread to the tiniest of a smile as he formed a perfect clone of the insect using his drier sand.

Shino's gasp from the back of the class was so worth the effort of sending the sand clone to Shino's table.

Feeling encouraged, Gaara created a small replica of Iruka, taking the chance experimenting the ratio of the wet and dry sand and tried to determine which ratio of the two he was able to manage with the least expenditure of energy. The result was still heavy in the dry sand part, but at least he knew the current level of his ability.

"Waaah," Chouji has trotted nearer, eyes wide and awed. "It's sensei! You make sensei! That's so cool!"

"Good job, Gaara!" Naruto has already started giggling, mischief emitted from him like waves of dark aura. "Now let's make it fun...," he cackled. "Make him dance! Make Iruka-sensei dance!"

Gaara has that split moment of seeing Kankurou in place of Naruto. The mirage was then followed by eagerness that brimmed in his chest—after all these times, he suddenly felt the child-like needs to fool around. He gladly obliged the request—extra training was now at the back of his mind—as he controlled the sand Iruka to fulfil Naruto's demand. Soon enough, the requests flooded in from his eager classmates. They shouted their requests over each other, praising and cooing Gaara over his control of the sand and kept asking him to make replicas of real things. Chouji asked for a variety of food while the girls threw in random animals into their requests—although he regretted that he did not know how an Onbuu looked like.

By the time the noises calm down, he already has multiple replicas of real life objects all over of his table, surrounding the blank-expressioned sand Iruka.

"Hey, why don't you give him a girlfriend?" Naruto cackled, pointing at the sand Iruka mischievously. "Iruka-sensei needs some romance in his life!"

Gaara was about to oblige to the request when he noticed that his tight circle of spectator has spread out and inching slowly to their respective seats. He looked up and just barely able to keep a poker face upon seeing Iruka stood right behind Naruto. He tried to signal Naruto to stop his commentaries on their teacher, but to no avail, Naruto was too occupied with his giggling at the description of the girlfriend he wanted to give to their teacher.

"That kind of woman, huh….," Iruka growled, practically emitting dark dangerous aura right now.

"Yes, yes! That kind of woman," Naruto laughed loudly, oblivious to the trouble behind him. "Iruka-sensei is a closet pervert, so Gaara, you need to—"

Gaara facepalmed.

"Pervert…huh?" Iruka closed his eyes, looking so close to exploding.

"Eh?" Naruto blinked in confusion.

He turned around the exact moment Iruka boomed;

"BOTH OF YOU, STAND OUTSIDE THE CLASS NOW!"

Gaara hurried to fulfil his punishment, leaving Naruto to plead their case. Not that Iruka was going to listen to the pleading anyway, so it was better if he got to position quickly. He didn't mind this simple punishment at all.

Plus, if he was tired, he could always make his sand armour hard enough to support his body while he relaxed throughout the whole punishment. As simple as that.

The most important thing was that he had fun entertaining his classmates earlier.

 _Worth it._

* * *

 **A/N: Being around Naruto makes him so mischievous. Lol.**

 **And Chouji is a total sweetheart cinnamon roll.**


	8. Chapter 8

"Do you think I can become a Hokage?"

Gaara halted his writing mid-sentence, turning his head towards Naruto just slightly to assess the situation.

He wasn't going to abandon this rather interesting chapter about Nidaime-sama's jutsu creation to entertain Naruto's boredom-induced shenanigans. It was the best part of Konoha's history.

And Gaara has lived long enough in Konoha to consider himself as a loyal citizen.

Or _, that_ was his excuse when being questioned on his odd hobby of reading the history books and having a rather large portrait of Nidaime-sama on his wall. Posters of famous movie actors or cartoon characters were too mainstream for him. Let him have his Nidaime-sama to talk to.

Naruto, to no one's surprise, has made no progress whatsoever with his homework—the pages of his workbook were still clean and empty, unlike Gaara who has already completed his homework and now was filling in his notebook with interesting facts he found in the history book he borrowed from the library.

Nidaime-sama was so fascinatingly great.

Gaara fleetingly wondered if _this_ book was going to explain deeper about the reanimation jutsu or it would follow the trend of the other books and simply stop at the introduction.

Though, sensing that his foster brother was serious about the question, Gaara completed his last sentence, closed his notebook and turned his chair around to face the mess Naruto has made on his bed. They both have their own room, but it was an unspoken agreement between the two that all studious serious thing that required concentration would be done in Gaara's room while the fun messy stuff would be done in Naruto's room.

Sometimes, Gaara wondered if this would be the exact same arrangement if Rasa allowed him to bond with his siblings. Maybe not. Kankurou was so protective of his puppets—even as a child—but it was fun to imagine stuff that would never happen.

It kept the memories of his biological siblings alive within him.

"Oiii, Gaara," Naruto whined, now dangling upside-down by the edge of Gaara's bed, pulling the previously neat sheets from the mattress with his kicking feet. "Answer me."

Gaara blinked and cracked a tiny smile.

That was another new thing he noticed. It was so much easier to smile here.

"You won't if you slack on your homework," he hummed, keeping his voice flat and matter-of-factly to annoy Naruto.

The pencil that Naruto tossed towards him hardly made an effect on Gaara's protective sand.

"Tch. Pesky sand…," Naruto grumbled but made no move to repeat the same futile attempts. Instead, he stared at Gaara, as if expecting a proper response.

Naruto was _really_ serious then.

"You're the son of the Hokage," Gaara started, pulling his legs up the chair to sit more comfortably in cross-legged position, arms crossed over his chest. "I'd say you would have a better chance than anyone else."

At least, that was how he remembered it was in Suna. The Kazekage _always_ came from the same clan who wielded the sand-manipulating kekkei genkai. To be honest, Gaara hardly knew anything about the politics in Konoha, considering that he has trashed everything that Suna taught him about Konoha the moment he felt Konoha's blood on his face as they protected him from his own kinsmen.

How could he even believe that Konoha's shinobi was his enemy when they were willing to bleed for his sake?

Not to mention that he has personally known Hatake Kakashi—who was infamous in Suna as an evil ninja who wouldn't hesitate to kill children—and Gaara only knew the young man as his former babysitter who lounged around reading dirty adult books. Sure, the guy was super strong considering that he was tasked on being their guard and trainer, but outside the training ground, Kakashi basically did nothing super.

Gaara couldn't even take Suna's horror stories of Konoha's shinobi seriously after having Kakashi as his babysitter during his younger years here. Plus, Minato was so protective over his childhood innocence, which unfortunately included the prohibition of any exposure to the political games that would scar his supposedly carefree innocent mind.

Gaara always wondered if the Hokage even knew how many people have died in Gaara's hands.

He had a hunch that the Hokage knew but has chosen to ignore it due to the stupidly endearing idealistic beliefs of Konoha leaders. It was stupid. It was so stupidly trusting. It was incredibly stupid of them to accept a bloodthirsty monster into their home.

It was heart-warming too.

"Gaaaaarrrrraaaaaaaa."

And Gaara better started paying attention to his brother or otherwise, his brain cells would be fried by Naruto's stubborn whining. He cracked another smile, wider this time to assure Naruto that yes, he was listening now, no need to whine anymore.

How in the world he ended up allowing Naruto to win the big brother title was a mystery. It was obvious who was the mature one here. He blamed those pleading blue eyes, though.

Naruto huffed and nodded once, seemingly satisfied with the attention he was receiving. "Being a Hokage's son does not guarantee anything," he mumbled, pulling his body up to stretch properly across Gaara's bed. "A Hokage is the strongest shinobi that is trusted to protect the village."

"We still have time to train to be stronger," Gaara assured. They have not yet graduated from the academy after all. Not to mention they have a long journey to become a jounin ahead of them. They have years to live through before they could even qualify as a strong shinobi.

"I know…," Naruto muttered, resting his hand above his stomach. "It's the trust that would be difficult to gain…"

Gaara subconsciously mirrored that movement, placing his hand above his beating heart, where he could feel the thrumming power of his new seal. If he has the same imaginative mindset as Naruto, he would probably say that he could _feel_ Shukaku purring there—but that was a ridiculous notion. Shukaku was sealed tight in his body. Gaara has never heard from his demon since the night he literally had the Hokage sobbing to his hair.

His gaze then fell on Naruto's hand, knowing that the other boy was attempting to feel Kyuubi despite Gaara's doubt that things would be _that_ easy.

Gaara couldn't help but quirk the tiniest of a smile, simply happy that he was able to read Naruto like the back of his own hand.

How twisted destiny was, that he found an understanding brother in what was supposedly be the enemy village. He has never trusted and let anyone into his shell before he met Naruto. Never was he able to read someone else so easily like this. They both shared a similar level of suffering that it was so easy for them to forge a strong bond with one another.

It was like their fate and destiny came from the same script.

Gaara was the son of Yondaime Kazekage. Naruto was the son of Yondaime Hokage.

Gaara housed Shukaku inside his body, while Naruto housed Kyuubi within his own.

They were both monsters—sealed into this fate by their own fathers. They both killed their own mothers and plunged their fathers into the depression of losing the women they loved. They both have tasted loneliness and faced the abusive scorns of their own villagers, despite the position of their fathers.

Well, that wasn't entirely true.

Yondaime Hokage refused to follow the pre-destined scripts, unlike his Kazekage counterpart.

Minato sealed Kyuubi inside Naruto to save his beloved village, with the faith that his son would be a great shinobi.

Rasa sealed Shukaku inside Gaara to strengthen his village, with the hope that his son would be a great weapon.

What did Rasa do when he heard that his son was abused by his villagers? He nodded to his council and ordered an assassination of his own child.

Meanwhile, in Konoha, Minato went all Lightning Rage and spent a straight 48 hours lecturing his people until they couldn't even meet his eyes without feeling ashamed with themselves.

No one openly blamed Naruto for the destruction Kyuubi did after that. They still shot him distrustful glances, but the verbal abuse has gone, out of fear of the Hokage's wrath. It was common knowledge that things could go straight to hell if the kindest person snapped, and no one in Konoha wanted to test that on their beloved Hokage.

"Did you know that they think Otou-chan is going to die soon?" Naruto was seemingly talking to the ceiling now, voice strained and too high to be calm. "That's why they're sending people out to find the Shodaime's granddaughter. It is to replace him when he passed."

Gaara vaguely recalled the times he caught the Hokage in a painful-looking fit of coughs, the splatters of red the man tried to hide from him yet Gaara could easily smell, and all those times the man trembled and needed to lean against the nearest firm surface as support…

Yes, he knew that.

"They blamed me for weakening Otou-chan," Naruto muttered, gripping the fabric of his shirt tight. "And the destruction of the village when Kurama ran amok back then…"

Naruto went silent for a moment, but Gaara's mind was not.

 ** _"Kekekekeke…The bastard told the brat his name…Interesting!"_**

Shukaku's unexpected musing almost caused Gaara to fall off his chair. After all, it was extremely rare for him to hear his demonic roommate after the new seal was applied. Not to mention that the beast has gone completely radio silence after that night he had his first heart-to-heart talk with his adoptive father.

 ** _"The Hokage fixed your seal, not silencing me forever."_** Shukaku grumbled. **_"Damned brat."_**

Was that… _fondness_ in Shukaku's tone?

Should Gaara panic now, or should he run straight to Minato so that the Hokage could finish him off before Shukaku ran amok?

 ** _"As if that softy is going to kill you."_**

Gaara considered that and begrudgingly admitted that Shukaku has a point. Should he run back to Suna then? At least, the people who would die in his hand were only innocent strangers and not his innocent family. That sounded horrible, but his options were limited.

Regardless, he really needed to get out of Konoha now—

 ** _"You could never outrun THE Yondaime Hokage when he is in his paternal rage."_**

The demon has a point again. But…

Why was Shukaku being nice and considerate?! This was not normal. Shukaku should be salivating to the idea of getting out of the peaceful mundane life in Konoha and returned to their original bloodthirsty life. This was definitely not normal. What in the seven heavens has even happened to his demon?

Confused and reasonably shaken, Gaara tried to tune into Shukaku's thoughts, only to be surprised at the beast's pondering;

 ** _"Hmm...I couldn't have him one-up me,"_** Shukaku sounded like he was scheming something evil, and that alone almost caused Gaara to panic. ** _"Bastard, I have my brat too."_**

What was that supposed to mean?

"Hey, Gaara...do you think that it was really my fault back then?" Naruto mused, snapping Gaara's attention back to the real world. "All those people that Kurama killed?"

"You're not to blame back then," regardless of his internal panic, Gaara assured his brother first, before going back to deal with his weirdly behaving demon. "It was not your fault, Naruto."

 _It was not my fault too_.

 ** _"Of course it isn't your fault, brat."_**

 _Eh?_

 ** _"_** ** _Even fools would know that an untrained child could not control me."_**

Gaara gaped at that nonchalant response from his demon. _What?_

"And neither was it Kurama's fault. Evil humans forced him into that path."

It should be impossible to be even more baffled after the weirdness that Shukaku displayed, but Gaara did end up frozen in shock, his jaw slacking down even further into confused gape upon hearing that stubbornly determined statement from his brother. Did he hear that right? Was Naruto defending his own demon? What the hell?

If he looked out of the window, would he see pigs flying in the sky? Would he see gold growing on the wall? Would he see Kakashi walking around bare-faced?

"What." Needless to say, Gaara was beyond dumbfounded.

On the other hand, Shukaku was howling in hysteric mirth in his head. If Gaara were to enter the realm where he could talk face-to-face with his demon, he was sure that the tanuki would probably be rolling in laughter right now. It was starting to give Gaara the start of a headache.

 ** _"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA…KURAMA YOU SMITTEN BASTARD."_**

Gaara didn't even want to start considering the idea that he has indeed lost his sanity. And the probability that someone has brainwashed Shukaku in the process too.

His top suspect was Minato.

Naruto beamed up at him, seemingly oblivious to Gaara's internal conflict as he flashed his teeth in a bright grin.

 _Bro, can you not_ —?

"They're more like us than we think, Gaara," the blonde said, eyes softened in fondness as he caressed his seal mark in a way that eerily reminded Gaara of the way pregnant mothers he saw in the market stroking their huge belly (which was a disturbing image to equate with his brother, to begin with).

"I beg your pardon?"

"They're just like us. Kurama, Shukaku, _us_ —we're the same."

Gaara blinked, exhaling slowly in a methodical way to calm himself. "What?" he said slowly, hoping that this confusing madness would end.

Naruto beamed brighter;

"They're alive like us too, Gaara."

Oh. What the hell.

* * *

 **A/N: I remember the episode of chibi smol beans Shukaku and Kurama. Those kids grew up wrong.**

 **As someone who has lost the people whom he knew have deeply loved him, I have this headcanon that Konoha!Gaara would worship Tobirama because he created the Reanimation Jutsu. Also, I think that a more loved Naruto would probably reach out to Kurama first as an innocent curious child because Minato raised him right (and he was probably wondering why the hell the demon inside him hates human so much and why can't they all be friends?).**

 **Plus, a friendly reminder that this was supposed to be a super-long one-shots before my natural laziness got the best of me. I've hinted that thing about Minato in the previous chapters. Lol**


	9. Chapter 9

Sometimes, Gaara wanted to lovingly hug Naruto.

With his sand. And probably broke a few bones too so that his brother would stop giving their father a headache.

The Hokage has already had too much on his plate—even when he was practically strapped into a hospital's bed and have Sandaime-sama conducted half of his workload—but it was still _too much_.

Otou-san didn't need _this_.

"I will not tell Minato about this," Sandaime-sama sighed, mirroring Gaara's own facepalm despite the quirk of prideful smile on his lips that Gaara knew Naruto did not miss. "But, I praise you for mastering a difficult technique in such a short time."

 _Why would you encourage him, Sandaime-sama?_

Gaara wanted to cry. He also wondered if his life would be less hectic with stupid shenanigan if he didn't leave Suna all those years ago. It would probably be, but Gaara wouldn't trade his current life with anything. He just has to live with Naruto's stupid decisions as the only downside of this relatively normal life in Konoha.

Only Naruto would consider stealing a forbidden scroll as the best alternative to pass his graduation test, instead of, you know, asking their father or the Sandaime or Kakashi to help him balance out Kurama's chakra that messed with his cloning jutsu before the next exam.

Naruto usually has no problem with the jutsu, but since he has the serious case of exam's anxiety, it affected Kurama too.

The person who said that tailed beasts did not feel anxiety definitely has never sat down and talked with the beasts.

Speaking of caring for their tailed beasts, somebody needed to make sure that the other tailed beasts were not sealed with the same seal Rasa has used on Gaara. The first thing that Shukaku did after they started their tentative friendship was to complain about all those years he was in pain.

Long story short, Gaara's original seal squeezed him of his power without any care of his well-being every time his power was used, hence making the tanuki grumpy and angry all the time. Thus, the beast complained and gave his host weeks' worth of horrible migraine.

If Gaara found it oddly made sense now that Shukaku was kind of fond of Minato, he was not going to comment on it. He has grown to love his naps. He didn't need Shukaku poisoning his sleep with either nightmares or weird imageries.

Anyway, building friendship and talking to each other solved every problem—even if it was a bloodthirsty grumpy tanuki. Naruto has even playfully named the technique as Therapy no Jutsu.

 _Therapy no Jutsu._

Only _Naruto_.

Gaara now felt that Shukaku was more like the grumpy cat he has a love-hate relationship with, while Naruto and Kurama definitely has a form of deep bond with each other that caused them to share almost everything.

So, to put it simply—Naruto was nervous, therefore Kurama was nervous too. Shukaku apparently has been using some tailed beasts' telepathic communication to taunt Kurama without Gaara's knowledge, which only made it worse for Naruto because it agitated the anxious Kurama.

It was a wonder Naruto could even produce a clone with that kind of nervous energy in his body.

Though, thanks to the not-surprisingly lenient judgement of Sandaime-sama, Naruto was now a genin too, despite him breaking into the _forbidden_ archive, and stole a _forbidden_ scroll to master a _forbidden_ jutsu and almost single-handedly murdered a power-thirsty wench posing as their teacher—because since when common sense and normal rules were applied in Konoha?

Since _never_.

At this rate, Gaara started to consider of allocating some spare time in his daily schedule to pray to Kami-sama for mercy on his poor, poor soul. Maybe he could sacrifice one of his many naps for the cause.

"Say…Gaara," Naruto mused as they made their way back home to freshen up and change. "Do you think we will be on the same team?"

Gaara pondered for a moment, slowing down his steps to match Naruto's relaxed pace. To be honest, he has been thinking about this even since before the exam.

Grouping him together with Naruto seemed like the wisest decision from the tactical standpoint, considering that the higher-ups could easily assign a strong jounin to the team and kept them both under close surveillance. There was no doubt that both of them were one of the village's assets, being the hosts to two tailed beasts that could be manipulated to protect the village. Having them under close surveillance of one unit would be a wise move. Plus, it would be highly beneficial in term of practicality and manpower resource too.

However, having grown to love Minato like his own father, Gaara also doubted that either he or Naruto would be treated like they were weapons. Plus, being the one who kept encouraging his kids to make friends, it seemed contradictory of Minato to assign Naruto and Gaara into the same group. What good will that made to their social skills if they were stuck with the very same person they grow up with as teammates?

The only downside of that one was that there wasn't many jounin in the village that could both keep in check and protect either one of the jinchuuriki. Taking someone off the ANBU elite team would not be beneficial in the long run since the shaky relationships Konoha has with other villages required more manpower to handle S-ranked missions rather than babysitting a bunch of genin doing low-ranked missions.

"Gaaaaraaa," Naruto frowned, walking backwards now so that he could face Gaara. "You're taking too long…What are you thinking?"

"Pros and cons of grouping us together."

"Haaa….?" Naruto shot him one of his infamous exaggerated expression of disbelief. "Is there any cons? Having you and me in one team will make the team invincible."

Gaara tipped his head, considering Naruto's words. Naruto has a point there. After all, there were lots of amazing perks for being the Hokage's sons.

Busy as he was, Minato always managed to find a small frame of time to oversee their improvements as a shinobi and help them train. It first started with the basics like chakra control and common jutsu, something that Minato deemed crucial considering the amount of chakras they were hosting in their bodies.

Then, Naruto has taken interest to inherit Minato's jutsu and the training suddenly become intense.

While Naruto religiously dedicated himself to master Minato's techniques, Gaara's training with his adoptive father was heavy on improving his concentration and stamina, considering that there was not much that the Hokage could teach him due to Gaara's extremely rare and unique magnetic release ability.

Plus, even if it was not because of the rare ability, Gaara has decided to focus on his secondary nature affinity, and Minato was not specialised in Earth style.

Inheriting the Kazekage's kekkei genkai would mean that he was more inclined to Earth and Wind as opposed to other elements, but when it came to his blood family—all of them were primarily Wind. Wind style felt as natural as breathing to him, but he preferred the grounding presence of his sand and since sand was a limited resource in Konoha...

His secondary affinity, the Earth style, was the closest he could get to make up for his lack of resource.

Thus, he drowned himself in reading the advanced scrolls Minato has gotten for him from the restricted sections, making notes and setting aside the jutsu that might in favour to his advantage to be applied in his training.

All these extra training, and the lessons they had with their own tailed beasts—it was safe to say that their raw strength might have surpassed a common chuunin at this point. Having them both in one-team would probably make completing a C-ranked mission on Day 1 as possible.

But that wouldn't be fair for the third member of the team, right? Unless if they were grouped with prodigious geniuses like Sasuke or Shino, there was no way for anyone of their classmates to be able to catch up with them both, let alone to synchronize with all four of them—the tailed beasts included.

At this rate, Gaara was ninety percent sure that he would not be on the same group as his brother. They would be too overpowered and that was never a good thing.

"I rather we are on a different team," Gaara remarked matter-of-factly, only to backtrack and added his reasonings before Naruto misunderstood him. "If we're on the same team, we will have less chance to work with different fighting styles."

"Hmmm…," Naruto pondered, face scrunched up in full concentration. "That somehow makes sense…," he agreed before he suddenly shuddered as if he just had a horrifying thought. "I just wish I'm not in the same group as Sasuke…"

Gaara snorted. "With your luck, I think you just jinx it."

"What?! No!" Naruto wailed, clawing his face in an exaggerated horror. "I don't want to be on the same team as that stuck-up bastard!" he whined loudly. " _It must be nice to be the Hokage's son, riding on your father's coattail_ ," Naruto's voice dropped lower to a poor mimicry of Sasuke's voice. "What does _he_ know?"

"That's the reason," Gaara hummed calmly. "He doesn't know. No one knew of our private training."

"Yeah…," Naruto grumbled, his expression scrunched up to a sulky pout. "Because people will panic if they see any signs of our tailed friends…."

To be honest, Gaara couldn't even fault them. Even if it was just a small transformation attributing to the beasts' chakra, their sparring session was not for the faint-hearted. Training Ground 4 looked like the remains of a war zone after each of their training that Gaara has to doubt Minato's words when the man said it was fine for them to continue abusing the area like that. Surely there were mountains of paperwork need to be dealt with to justify the destructions of the training ground, right?

"Will you blame them?"

"Come on!" Naruto retorted voice pitched higher in frustration. "Shukaku is not even half-bad and Kurama is a tsundere dork."

Gaara did not even want to know what had happened between Naruto and Kurama that the boy ended up describing the Kyuubi as a 'tsundere dork'.

"Naruto, be reasonable and try to think from _their_ point of view."

Naruto pondered for a moment before the defiant tension in his shoulder slackened and the blonde slumped dejectedly, sighing in defeat.

"I guess it is expected…."

Gaara smiled. "Right."

The remaining journey home was uneventful as Naruto moped and grumbled under his breath, the aura of depression hung over him like a dark cloud. They only picked up their pace once they reached the Namikaze-Uzumaki house, finally realising that they need to hurry, or they will be late to meet their team. Naruto was first to rush in, crashing the door open and skipping a few steps of the stairs as he rushed to the bathroom to clean himself of the remains of last night's adventure.

Gaara closed the door quietly behind him and arranged Naruto's scattered shoes first before he let himself in. Old habit from life in desert caused him to take less time to wash up, thus he decided to throw in some quick breakfast for them first before tending to his own hygiene needs. By the time Gaara was done with his shower, Naruto has already finished his breakfast. The blonde boy bounced on his feet, impatient at Gaara's slow pace. He then groaned in frustration, shoved an onigiri into Gaara's mouth, grabbed the milk carton before he practically dragged Gaara all the way to the academy.

"Yosh! Let's meet our team!"

Gaara sighed. The things he did for his brother...

* * *

 **A/N : Yaayy, they're genins now...well, until they have to face the second test with their teachers that is. Next will be the meeting with their teams. I also have drawn what I envisioned this version of Konoha!Gaara and Strong!Naruto on their first day as genins, so lemme know if you want link to that little drawing.**


	10. Chapter 10

Gaara knew Naruto well.

Therefore, it was not surprising at all for him to allow himself to be dragged by his collar all the way to the academy. It was so Naruto thing to do, and he didn't expect anything less.

Thus, it brought them to this situation, of which Gaara calmly spreading out his actual breakfast on the table, while playing blind to the curious stares of their classmates and the disbelieving gape on Naruto's face.

"When did you pack a bento?!" Naruto pointed an accusing finger towards him.

"When you're in the shower," Gaara answered, sipping on his milk. "I know you're going to drag me out before I could have my breakfast."

Best. Foresight. Ever.

Gaara knew Naruto way too well to allow him the advantage of preparing for this.

Naruto's response was to react as if he was completely scandalised.

Though, the blonde boy didn't say anything and opted to slouch next to Gaara, sneaking anticipating glances every time the door was slid open. Each time, he would sink back into his seat, getting more and more agitated when it was not his name that was called by the jounin that came in. Bit by bit, the class become empty as jounin instructors kept coming in to pick up their charge, and simultaneously, Naruto got more and more agitated with impatience.

By lunchtime, there were only six of them—Naruto, Akane, Taiko, Sasuke, Sakura and Gaara himself— that remained in the classroom.

Naturally, it was not the most of lively combo, especially with Naruto's agitation, Sasuke's brooding, Taiko's nervousness and Gaara's natural silence. It was like the girls were the only people in the room that seemed to not be affected too much by their late teachers—both of Akane and Sakura were huddled at a table, chatting under their breaths with Sakura's occasional glancing towards Sasuke. On the boy's side of the classroom, the silence thickened for each passing second.

The tensed silence was so thick Gaara could practically felt Taiko trembling as Sasuke's temperamental brooding intensified.

Only Kami-sama knew how the hell such temperamental child has a calm sweetheart as an older brother.

Gaara was considering to interfere when he noticed Taiko's nervousness has reached a point that the shy boy couldn't even _talk_ with all the impatient gloomy aura that was clouding over their heads. It was then that Naruto, being the lord and saviour to all awkward situations, snapped out of his agitation and decided to set up a prank for their jounin instructors.

The tensed silence turned to anticipative silence.

When the door was opened, and someone was pushed in to become the poor victim of Naruto's prank, the silence was broken with cheers from Naruto, Sakura and (surprisingly) Sasuke.

"What is this?!" The poor jounin whimpered, dusting the white chalk off his dark hair. "What is the meaning of this?!"

Taiko started to fumble, flailing his arms around in horrified panic while shooting cautious glances towards the cheering group. Akane eventually stood to become the mediator, trying to hush the three cheering genins while in the same time calming Taiko down from his panic-induced flailing.

Gaara considered for a moment before he willed his sand to wrap around Naruto's wrist and gently tug his brother to sit.

Even though it was the jounins' fault for being late, this was kinda a bad impression for all of them.

"Rite of passage for all sensei," the all-too-familiar voice sounded too cheerful to be innocent, and Gaara watched Naruto's eyes slowly widened as Kakashi walked in. "Congratulations, my friend," the silver-haired man said, placing a hand over the pranked jounin's shoulder. "You're now officially a sensei."

"Ehhhhh?" Naruto jerked back, almost like he was recoiling from a snapping snake. "Kakashi-no-niisan?" he stuttered, pointing a shaky finger in Kakashi's direction.

"Yo, Naruto," Kakashi greeted casually.

"What are you doing here?!" Naruto's voice boomed, bouncing off the walls of the classroom. "Aren't you—"

"Ah?" Kakashi laughed, cutting Naruto's stammering off with a nonchalant wave of his hand. "I'm retired to become ordinary jounin a few years ago."

"We have a rite of passage?" The other jounin asked.

"Ehhhh? Seriously, Kakashi-no-niisan?!" Naruto shouted, successfully drowning the jounin's voice.

Naruto's voice was far louder than his, thus needless to say that the poor jounin was pointedly ignored.

"Call me 'sensei', Naruto," Kakashi reprimanded with a sigh, but then his expressive eye crinkled in the way that Gaara immediately sensed danger. "And it's not nice to prank on your teachers," he added with a dark tone.

"I thought you said that this is a rite of passage?!" The other jounin finally turned around to show his full face to them.

Gaara noted the flicker of recognition in Sasuke's eyes with mild curiosity.

He has never seen _this_ jounin before, and that was saying something. He has seen plenty of jounins growing up—especially whenever they dropped by the Hokage Tower to give Minato his bento—but he has never come across this one. He ought to notice if he had seen this jounin, because the scars on the right half of his face were difficult to not remember. And it was not common for people to cover their left eye—so far, he has only seen Kakashi with that kind of fashion choice.

"Kakashi, if you knew that they have set it up, you should have—"

"All right!" Kakashi cut him off, completely ignoring the responding death aura from the jounin behind him. "Uzumaki Naruto, Haruno Sakura and Uchiha Sasuke—the three of you will be with me in Team 7."

The jounin glowered at Kakashi's back, looking so close to yell at the silver-haired man. However, typical of Gaara's former babysitter, Kakashi shrugged it off like it was nothing. Instead, the silver-haired jounin dragged Naruto by the scruff of his collar, nodding to the other two genins to follow him.

With that, Team 7 left, leaving Gaara with his now official teammates and jounin instructor.

"That Kakashi…," their strange teacher grumbled, still wiping the white dust off his hair before he gave up and decided to finally pay attention to them. "Sorry about that…," he grinned, his gaze flitted to each of the genins, only to linger a second too long on Gaara's face. "This is the first time I'm assigned as a teacher," he then admitted with a sheepish hunch of his shoulders.

"It's okay, sensei!" Akane—the least socially awkward among them—assured, offering a gentle smile to their nervous teacher.

"It was a bad first impression, isn't it….," the jounin sighed—the metaphorical cloud of depression hung over his head again. "It is my first day as a sensei and I give a bad impression to my students…."

That dejected mumbling was then followed by awkward silence. Though, the mood didn't last too long as the man suddenly bounced back to a cheerful mood, grinning at them as if he was not hunched in depression just a minute ago.

 _Huh. Strange man._

"Alright, kids!" the jounin started again, more enthusiastic this time. "We're Team 12 and you're…" he looked at Akane first, "Moerushio Akane," he said before shifting his gaze at Taiko, "Hikoshishi Taiko…"

Taiko nodded with a shy smile. The jounin beamed brightly.

"And lastly…Namikaze Gaara—?"

Gaara tried really hard to not react at the last name and opted to a small nod. It still felt odd, because the concept of a last name was not common in Suna. But, he was a citizen of Konoha now, and it wasn't too bad to have a last name attached to his own. It was far better than people recognizing him because of his birthplace.

Sabaku no Gaara literally means Gaara of the Desert. The name honestly sounded like a folklore told to scare children to not wander in the desert.

Wander alone in the desert and Sabaku no Gaara would come and eat you. Wander alone in the desert and Sabaku no Gaara would take you and consume your soul—something like that.

Thus, he really appreciated Minato's offer to add a proper last name to his own. He was hesitant at first, but Naruto has vehemently claimed that he wanted to honour Kushina as the last Uzumaki, therefore they all decided that Gaara would be the one who carried Minato's last name.

It felt symbolic somehow, like he really belonged in the family.

Gaara's internal musing was cut off when suddenly, their teacher suddenly shrieked in panic;

"OH, NO! I'M SUPPOSED TO LET YOU INTRODUCE YOURSELF!"

Gaara frowned as the jounin sunk to his knees—the man was mumbling something that suspiciously sounded like distasteful grumbling about ' _stupid, inconsiderate Kakashi leaving me on my first day'_ as the figurative dark cloud hung over his sulking form (again).

What was wrong with their teacher?

Gaara cast a quick glance to his teammates, only to sigh when they directed their sheepish hopeful gaze at him. Their gaze seemed like they were offering their trust to him and appointing him as their team leader and spokesperson to deal with their odd teacher.

He was not going to admit that a huge part of him was glad that they trusted him to be the spokesperson.

When he was far younger, he didn't even have anyone apart from Yashamaru to talk to, let alone to have people trusting him to lead them. To have his teammates' trust meant a lot to him. Thus, Gaara stood and walked up to their teacher, squatting to level his height with the kneeling jounin.

"Sensei?" he prompted, causing the jounin to stop muttering childish insults to Kakashi's name.

The single dark eye flickered to Gaara's face, and suddenly Gaara felt Shukaku hissed.

"Gaara-kun?"

"We would love to have you join us for lunch, sensei," Gaara suggested, ignoring the tension that bled from the tailed beast and cracked a tiny smile to comfort the man.

Akane nodded enthusiastically, already kneeling beside Gaara. "We can have our proper introduction then, sensei," she added, her smile was warm and pleasant.

"I know a good place," Taiko shyly inputted, standing just slightly behind Gaara.

Gaara could have sworn that the jounin was tearing up—which made it even more confusing because that wasn't dignified or dangerous at all—yet Shukaku was acting like the metaphorical hissing cat on defensive mode right now. The sand tanuki was on high alert, something that Gaara used to feel only when Rasa sent assassins after him.

"All of you…," the jounin whimpered, lips stretched to a bright grateful smile. "…are angels!" he cheered, glomping all of the fresh genins in a hug.

Well…this was _unexpected._

"Kakashi kept saying that fresh genins are cocky demon incarnates but I get you…brilliant angels!" he remarked, voice loud and cheery. "Let's work together to make you strong shinobi Konoha would be proud of!"

Gaara was so confused on why Shukaku considered that this silly man was a dangerous threat. He seemed like a very nice person, albeit somehow acting like he has unstable mood swings.

"Um, sensei…," Akane called tentatively once they were relieved from the bone-crushing hug. "What should we call you?"

Ah, yes. They didn't catch his name.

"Obito!" The jounin cheered, giving them a thumbs-up. "My name is Uchiha Obito. You can call me Obito-sensei!"

* * *

 **A/N: The last name for Gaara's teammates are literally chosen from Google Translate. Moerushio is a mashed up of 'blazing' and 'tide' while Hikoshishi came from me messing with the Japanese translation for 'flying' and 'boar'.**

 **And yes, since I'm not sure if I'm gonna ever divulge into this particular background story, I'm just gonna tell it here. In this AU, Itachi is not the one tasked to end the Uchiha coup. The third Uchiha volunteered to did it, to atone his crimes for having a role in releasing Kyuubi when Naruto was born. Minato had him in house arrest with Kakashi (and full surveillance of an ANBU team) since then. It was after he assassinated his clan that he was given the permission to venture the village and slowly integrate himself back into the society. During the assassination, Itachi was sent out of the village with Sasuke to keep the brat from knowing about the actual assassin. That's why Sasuke's brooding personality in this AU has no ties to ultimate hatred or anything, but simply for having the common case of pre-teens bratty short temper. He will grow out of it (hopefully).**

 **This AU is meant to be lighter and less bloody and less vengeful than the original one with stupid humour and adorable tailed beasts.** **And double yes, Obito is their sensei. I just saw a picture on Pinterest** **of him with Kakashi in jounin uniforms, being the dorks they are and I decided that I want that in my AU.**

 **Next up is the infamous bell test. Combo version, with the teams against Kakashi and Obito.**

 **P/s: This story is getting longer than I originally planned. It was supposed to be a one-shot...**

 **What the hell am I doing with my life.**


	11. Chapter 11

The instruction was simple.

Get the bells from their sensei, and they will pass the second test to become an official genin.

However, the test has a lot of problems.

 **#Problem number 1 :** There are only 4 bells—two on Kakashi and two on Obito. The problem was, there were six genins that wanted to pass.

 **#Problem number 2 :** Both of their teachers were not ordinary jounin. Kakashi was a former ANBU, while Obito was a mysterious dark horse, but likely was equally as strong as Kakashi.

 ** _#Problem number 2.5 :_** _Both of Kurama and Shukaku were wary of Obito._ _Kurama got an exceptionally bad vibe whenever Obito was around_. _Gut feeling the fox has said, but it was enough to make all four of them—two bijuus and two jinchuurikis—on edge._

 **#Problem number 3 :** They were instructed to not eat anything before coming to their jointed meeting this morning.

The problem was, a hungry Naruto was a cranky Naruto.

A cranky Naruto has attacked their teachers before the jounins could even finish talking.

A cranky, starving Naruto would abandon all plans and strategies in favour of crushing everything as quickly as possible so that he could drag Gaara to Ichiraku Ramen.

A cranky, starving and provoked Naruto was deemed too impulsive that his own team abandoned him to fall back and strategize while he went on chasing after Kakashi.

And Gaara, having been shadowing Naruto since childhood, has gone in an automatic pursuit of his brother, leaving his own teammates behind.

That was a recipe of instant defeat.

(Or that was what would be expected of them.)

"You kids are too impulsive," Kakashi drawled, sounding exasperated. "Have you forgotten the importance of strategizing?"

"You—" Naruto grunted, struggling to free his head from the oppressive force of Obito's foot, his blue eyes rolled to the side to glare at Kakashi. "I'm gonna beat you both to pulp."

Obito has the guts to laugh. "You have a hot-tempered student, Kakashi."

"Remind me of someone."

"Oi."

Naruto growled, the sound was animalistic and demonically violent that Obito yelped and almost let the boy go, only to make it up by twisting Naruto's pinned arm behind him and sat on the small of the boy's back.

"I forget that you're a jinchuuriki…," the one-eyed Uchiha hummed, although his taunting smile was not in line with his wary words. Obito cast a brief look around at their surroundings, his dark eye was sharp and scrutinizing, as if he was looking for someone else. "Gaara-kun is always the intimidating one…"

Naruto _smirked_.

"You better not forget that, _sensei_ ," the blonde boy basically purred.

"You'll fail if you use your bijuu, Naruto," Kakashi sighed, squatting to tap Naruto's restrained head with his book. "That's the rule. You're not allowed to use the tailed beast's power throughout this test."

"I don't need Kurama to beat you."

Both jounins exchanged a glance before Obito started giggling while Kakashi let out a heavy sigh.

"Maa….I guess we'll take you out first and then we'll deal with Gaara-kun," Kakashi decided, keeping his precious porn literature inside his pouch. He then brought down his chakra-covered hand down to Naruto's back. "Sorry, Naruto. It's time for you to slee—"

He didn't have the chance to complete his words.

Kakashi turned just in time to destroy one of Naruto's clone that was trying attack him from behind—the kunai in the clone's hand ripped his left sleeve apart. The clone disappeared in a puff of smoke, only to reveal the other four clones that immediately latched themselves on Kakashi to restrain his movements and wrestle the bells from him.

That was when Naruto's face underneath Obito's feet cracked.

Kakashi's eyes widened as curses slipped from his masked mouth.

"Obito! Get off!" he yelled, barely able to evade the explosion—Naruto's clones committed a Kamikaze attack by activating the paper bomb on their bodies at the same time the one underneath Obito disintegrated completely to living sand.

Kakashi managed to leap away from the explosion, only to hiss in disbelief when Gaara's sand was already waiting to trap him. The Copy Ninja beat a hasty retreat, having to use Raikiri to escape the encasing sand.

Jinchuuriki were at another level of danger indeed.

"What the hell," Obito huffed, a grumbled curse slipped his lips when the tendrils of sand almost grasped his ankle. "I thought we have separated them?!"

The sand lashed towards him, causing him to let out an undignified shriek when the sand trapped him into a gigantic sand ball. Kakashi swore, already about to counterattack when the sand ball grew distorted from the inside. It then suddenly exploded with a bang and dramatic flames.

Obito landed on a tree with a barely singed sleeve.

"Oii, kids!" he yelled towards the silent trees. "You're supposed to take the bells. Not trying to kill us!"

The response he got was another lash of sand trying to seize him. He threw a paper bomb towards the sand, only to grit his teeth in annoyance when the sand parted to two, causing the bomb to explode mid-air without harming anyone. As if he just jinxed himself with the earlier comment, the sand formed and hardened to small sharp needles, hovering in the air like an omen of doom.

The sand needles then rained down on the jounins.

"What the hell," Obito breathed, eye widened in utter disbelief, though the next second he was already weaving a rapid series of hand signs, " _Katon : Gokakyu no Jutsu."_

The fireball didn't even affect the deadly rain of sand needles, but instead only enhanced them by making it raining _fire_ sand needles.

Obito regretted everything in his life.

"Oh. Fuck."

"You idiot…," Kakashi growled and quickly weaved hand signs of his counterattack. " _Suiton : Suiryūdan no Jutsu."_

Twin water dragon lashed out towards the offensive sand, successfully repelling them before it could reach Obito. The sand landed on the ground as splatters. The splatters of sand could still move, now regrouping to form an unsteady blob in front of Kakashi. The Copy Ninja once again used a water attack to immobilise the heavy sand to a sad wet lump that eventually died down.

Obito leapt down from the tree he was standing on, poking at the unmoving sand with a long stick, as if he was scared to come any closer.

"Are you kidding me?" The Uchiha mumbled. "They actually come at us with intent to kill."

"I forget that Gaara-kun is a closet sadist."

Obito turned to stare at him with his eye so wide it looked like it would pop out of the socket.

Kakashi ignored the bewildered look on his friend's face in favour of observing their surroundings. He was honestly starting to get on edge now that he could not detect any of their students in the area. Those kids were coming at them with intent to kill and Kakashi didn't like being the one who was hunted.

"I beg your pardon?" Obito said.

"Gaara-kun is a closet sadist. The brat got off by seeing other people squirmed in misery."

"What?" The Uchiha hissed, disbelieving. "My students are angels!"

"Remember that one time I thought I was infected by a strange parasite?'

"When you kept whining about feeling something crawled all over your body and giving you tiny pinpricks, but we see nothing?"

"Yep," Kakashi nodded, rubbing his hands all over his arms in bad memories. "That was his sand. Trust me, those kids are volatile pranksters," he sighed, shuddering a bit. "Especially the one who speaks the least…"

Obito's single eye flashed red. "Then we need to get serious, right?"

Kakashi resisted the urge to fondly rolled his eyes.

* * *

 **A/N: I suck at fight scene. But there are only a few more to go, so bear with me. I'm not sure if I'm gonna continue this to chuunin exam or not (probably not since the original "one-shot" was supposed to consist of chapter 1,2,3,6,8 and the epilogue), so let's see if the epilogue will be coming soon or it will be a faraway goal. lol**

 **And yes, Gaara did prank Kakashi that one time. It was a revenge.**

 **This one he didn't hold back because he knew that the sensei-tachi would be able to avoid his attacks. It is also another revenge for making him skip his breakfast.**


	12. Chapter 12

**A/n: Warning for a small non-friendly writing to Sakura. I'm sorry.**

* * *

Obito's single eye flashed red. "Then we need to get serious, right?"

Kakashi resisted the urge to fondly rolled his eyes.

"Need to get those two out of the game first," Kakashi sighed but slowly straightened his forehead protector, revealing his own sharingan. "They will ruin our test if we let them loose."

"What? You scared of kids, Kakashi?"

"We do this test for a purpose, Obito."

"Yeah, yeah," Obito shrugged. "Whatever you say, _senpai_."

Kakashi stared thoughtfully at the sand pile for a moment, weighing his decision. Gaara and Naruto could be really good at hiding when they wanted to—he has had first-hand experiences from all those hide-and-seek game the kids have roped him in when they were much younger. Plus, Gaara's all-rounder abilities and Naruto's raw offensive power were both highly effective and troublesome when they were put together.

To remain standing idly right here was just like offering themselves on silver platters to those kids. At this rate, it might be good to find the other kids first instead of waiting for the jinchuuriki brothers to appear. Other than the jinchuuriki, neither of the kids have ever worked together. They would be easy victims. Kakashi and Obito could still achieve the objectives of this test then.

"Change of plan," Kakashi suddenly said. "Let's split up and get rid of the rest first. They are not as compatible as Naruto and Gaara, so they will be alone and easier to take out."

Obito went silent for a brief moment before he broke to a huge grin.

"I can't believe that we are seriously ganging up on our 12 years old students."

"Just get your ass moving, Obito."

With that, both jounins separated ways to hunt for their students.

Unknown to them, just a few metres beneath the sad wet lump of sand, three of their students were huddled underground, listening on them. Taiko knelt in the centre of the underground cavity, holding up the shape with full concentration. On his sides, Naruto and Gaara shared a similar mischievous grin to each other, emitting a creepy demonic aura that low-key terrified their perfectly normal friend.

Shinobi rules 101 : _Always_ gather intel on your opponent and mission before doing anything.

They were the Hokage's sons. Lessons on military strategies and shinobi principles were drilled into their head the moment they approached Minato to train them. Cranky hungry as he was, Naruto did not forget his lessons. Plus, they grew up having Kakashi as their semi-permanent babysitter-slash-guard-slash-trainer. They have learnt through the hardest way that when it came to dealing with S-ranked shinobi like the silver-haired jounin, they'd need to have enough intel and strategies to have the slightest chance of success.

Thus, they sought a hiding place and strategized their next move.

Taiko found them by pure coincidence. The shy boy has thought that the brothers were hiding after an assault, hence, being a good teammate he was, Taiko literally cracked the Earth open and dragged them into this underground cavity to hide with him.

It was an undeniably a good hiding spot.

"I _knew_ it," Naruto smirked, cackling mischievously. "Kakashi-no-nii—"

"—sensei," Gaara corrected, double-checking the seal papers on their little cavity, nodding in satisfaction when he was sure that the barrier seals were still working. "He is our sensei now."

Naruto scowled but didn't retort. Gaara grinned at him.

"Ano…," Taiko said with a voice so soft it was barely audible. "What is that all about?"

"Kakashi is a _troll_ ," Naruto said, as if that would explain anything. "He is a gigantic troll that enjoys messing with other people."

"Um, okay…?"

Taiko still looked clueless, thus, Gaara added, "When Kakashi does weird things, they usually have an unexpected twist. This whole thing of failing two of us might have been a charade," he explained, keeping his voice soft just in case the jounins could sense them even with the barrier up. "Genin teams usually work in a three-man formation with a jounin instructor. It is illogical to send one of us back to the academy because then the team will be short-staffed afterwards."

"So you're saying that their instruction is purposely misleading us to turn against each other?" Taiko asked, shuddering a bit. "That's so mean of them! They break apart our team and had us against each other right on the first second."

Gaara and Naruto had a light bulb moment after hearing Taiko's words.

"Team!" They exclaimed in unison.

"Uh…?"

"Taiko, you're a genius," Naruto beamed, slapping the smaller boy on his back.

"Can you still move us underground, Taiko?" Gaara asked, honestly a bit concerned to see the trembles of Taiko's skinny arms. "We need to find and regroup with everyone without being caught by them."

"I'm sorry…," Taiko mumbled, looking down at his own shaky hands. "I only have enough chakra to keep us under here for the next 5 minutes."

There was a beat of silence. Taiko hung his head low, ashamed that he couldn't even do much when these two have organized a faux assault to gain intel for their collective benefits.

"If it is chakra that you need, you can have some of mine," Naruto offered, extending his glowing palm towards the boy. "Seriously. We need to work in a team to get through this test."

"Naruto, we are not to use the bijuu's power," Gaara reminded, eyeing Naruto's glowing palm pointedly.

"Kurama's chakra is red," Naruto grinned, wriggling his palm—the glowing chakra was blue. "This is mine. Tou-chan said that I naturally have large chakra reserves like the rest of Uzumaki clan," his grin grew mischievous, as he shared his chakra with Taiko—the relief on the smaller boy's face was evident, even in the dim lighting. "So, I'm not breaking the rule, and he can't fail me."

"Thank you, Naruto-kun," Taiko breathed out in relief, hands moving fluidly in a series of hand signs and all of sudden, their little cavity enlarged to a size that could fit their remaining friends. "I'm ready when you are, Gaara-kun."

Gaara nodded and closed his left eye, connecting his optic nerve to his third eye outside. He moved his third eye around, seeking for the rest of their team and ended up finding Sasuke and Sakura first. The young Uchiha was in a clearing not far from their current location. Sasuke was literally neck deep in the ground, being mocked and taunted by Kakashi while Sakura was hiding nearby, looking like she was stalking the perfect chance to attack their sensei.

Gaara's palm made contact with his face when the pink-haired girl easily fell into Kakashi's genjutsu.

Sakura screamed before she fell unconscious next to Sasuke's head.

"For real…?" the red-headed jinchuuriki muttered in disbelief.

Gaara waited until Kakashi left before double-checking the surroundings. Once he confirmed that neither of the jounins was around, he turned towards Taiko and Naruto.

"Sasuke and Sakura are in a clearing 300 metres northwest from us," he directed, before returning to his search his last remaining teammate.

Taiko moved their cavity towards the rest of Team 7—performing strange katas that Gaara had never seen before as they moved underground—Naruto's glowing hand remained in contact with his shoulders. Gaara sent his third eye all over the training ground in his search for Akane, only to wince when he found her.

The only kunoichi in his team was thrown brutally to a tree by their own teacher, looking like she just went through hell and back.

There went Obito's nice guy image—straight outta the metaphorical window.

Thankfully, Kakashi was nowhere to be seen.

Gaara barely heard the Earth cracked open when Sasuke and Sakura fell ungraciously into their underground cavity. He had his focus on the battle between his teammate and their teacher, taking note of Obito's leisure smile and Akane's struggle to protect herself from their teacher's continuous giant fireballs attack. Obito moved fluidly, his sharingan was activated and the jounin looked like he was hardly breaking any sweat.

On the other end, Akane staggered onto her shaky legs in the middle of the tiny stream. Her clothes were both singed and drenched, one of her twin braids was untied—hiding her face from view as she hung her head in defeat.

Obito commented on Gaara trying to kill them, but yet the sensei himself was brutal.

"Akane is in trouble," Gaara said, successfully silencing whatever silly argument Sasuke was having with Naruto. "Obito-sensei had her cornered. They are at the stream."

"Crap," Naruto cussed.

"Language," Sakura chided.

"We need to hurry," Gaara urged, cutting off whatever Naruto had as a retort to the pink-haired kunoichi.

"They are at a stream?" Taiko piped in, though he didn't stop performing the katas that moved their little makeshift bunker towards the other side of the ground where Akane and Obito were. "Then, we don't have to worry much."

"Ehhh?" Sakura questioned. "Why would you say that?"

Taiko tipped his head back to smile at them. "Akane's father and sister trained her since she was young. Their family is heavily-oriented on _suiton_ jutsu. She may not be strong like the three of you—" he nodded towards Naruto, Gaara and Sasuke before resuming, "—but she is pretty good. If she has water, she is fine."

True to Taiko's words, Gaara's third eye saw Akane weaving hand signs behind the cover of her hair, and all sudden there was a wall of water rushing towards Obito like a mini-tsunami, successfully knocking the man off guard. Gaara saw Akane countered Obito's responding fireball with a jet of water that streamed out of her mouth before she beat a hasty retreat while Obito was distracted.

Gaara directed Taiko towards their last teammate—the shy boy was barely able to pull her underground into their bunker without being seen or heard—when Obito came trudging towards them.

"Oh,my kawaii genins~" Obito sang—from Gaara's third-eye view, he was literally skipping his merry way in his search for them—his voice sounded so close somewhere above them. "Come out, come out, wherever you are, sweethearts~"

Gaara shuddered. That was _scary_.

They remained silent for a moment as Gaara's third eye kept watch on Obito until the jounin was far enough from them. Sure, Gaara has had the insight to bring the barrier seals he recreated from his reading, but he has no idea how long it could retain its power to hide their chakra from the teachers' sharingan.

It was when he brought down his hand that all six of them let out a sigh of relief.

"You look like hell," Naruto commented, doing a once-over on Akane's state and promptly shuddered.

"Our sensei is strong," Akane huffed, ripping the lower half of her skirts to be the makeshift bandage for her bleeding leg. "But what are you all doing together? I thought this is an individual test?"

"That is what I have been saying," Sasuke echoed, almost looking like he was pouting from the dim-lighting if the cavity. "This is an individual test."

"These three kidnapped us," Sakura accused, pointing towards Naruto, Gaara and Taiko.

"We saved you," Naruto scowled. "The sensei are going to use you as hostages to lure the rest of us out."

Sasuke scowled while Sakura pointedly looked away.

Naruto let out a long sigh of exasperation. Meanwhile, Gaara considered bashing their heads together with his sand.

"Fine, if you're not going to thank me and Gaara, at least show some gratefulness to Taiko," the blonde jinchuuriki said, nodding towards Taiko who were still working hard maintaining their hiding spot. "He is the one that has been doing the hard work to get everyone together."

"Eh, no! It's because of your chakra that I'm able to do this, Naruto-kun," Taiko denied vehemently.

"Oh, really?" Sakura muttered. Her voice was laced with doubts as she narrowed her eyes in suspicion at Naruto. "You're using him to pass this test, Naruto?"

Naruto scowled at her, annoyed at her comment, but Gaara's sand wrapped around his wrist—a subtle grounding support for his flaring ego. Naruto used to have a huge crush on Sakura, but after years of being belittled and ridiculed because of his tendency to play harmless pranks on everyone, Naruto was considerably fed-up. He still thought her cute, but every time she belittled him, Naruto didn't have that reserved needs to please a crush. His fiery spirit would instantly defend himself.

Kurama was a wonderful influence on Naruto's confidence and self-preservation. Bless that fox.

"So, what is all of these are about?" Akane asked before Sakura could even open her mouth to question Naruto. "You know that two out of the six of us are going to fail," she huffed, eyes cold and determined. "I'm sorry guys, but those people won't be me."

Naruto and Gaara exchanged a glance, looking eeriely like twins.

"What?" Sasuke scowled.

"We need to unite to beat them both. As a _team,_ " Naruto started.

"That's the only way all of us can pass—together, without abandoning anyone," Gaara ended.

* * *

 **A/N: The regrouping. Yesss, they will face the sensei-tachi next chapter and I could stop butchering all of these horrible fight scenes. I'm still considering whether to continue this after that (since this mischievously sadistic Gaara has yet to reunite with Temari and Kankurou), or just end it with epilogues. Maybe. Need to think some more. lol**

 **Thank you for everyone who has been reading, favouriting/following and reviewing up to this point. I really appreciate it!**


	13. Chapter 13

Akane and Taiko were elected as the baits.

As much it irked Gaara that both of his teammates were chosen to be the baits, he was outvoted with four against two. Akane voted for herself to be one of the baits, considering that she was the one with the worst injuries among all of them and her current injuries would allow her to play the vulnerable card well. Taiko elected himself because he was the weakest link—having used up almost all of his chakra earlier and won't be useful at all.

Naturally, neither Sasuke nor Sakura wanted to volunteer themselves as baits.

Naruto has placed his hand on Gaara's shoulder and shook his head upon noticing Gaara's foul mood. Acknowledging the blonde's attempt to comfort, Gaara gritted his teeth and bit back his protest.

It took all of his willpower to do so, moreover now that he was half-convinced that his jounin instructor was a literal psychopath.

To be accurate, Gaara thought that the jounin was a psychopath with worrying signs of being an actual bipolar.

That's it. That was Uchiha Obito.

It was _concerning_.

"Found you~" Obito sang, peering over the tree trunk and beamed his sunshiny smile when he found the baits. "Hello, my kawaii genins~!"

Sakura violently shuddered while Sasuke looked like he was going to deny that he was related to Obito.

"Aww, look at the adorable terror in your face. So cute," the jounin cooed, merrily tying up his students to the tree stumps. "Why are you trembling, Taiko? I'm not going to hurt you."

Taiko openly whimpered.

Akane, however, was hiding the quirk of her smile behind her trussed hair.

" _The only normal person in your team is Taiko_ ," Naruto commented through their bijuu links, grinning madly. _"The rest of you are crazy."_

Gaara snorted but didn't comment on anything. Instead, he paid attention to his teammates.

Although neither of his teammates made it as the top students of the academy, Gaara was aware of their all-rounder abilities. All three of them were some sorts of the jack-of-all-trades, having flexibility in term of manipulating their abilities towards all three divisions of offence, defence and spying although they all have their own preference when it came to the division they focused on.

When it came down to their personal preferences, Taiko predominantly focused on his defences, while Gaara balanced between his offences and defences equally.

Akane, on the other hand, was violently offensive as well as deceivingly adorable spy.

The fact that her lineage came from reclusive-almost-extinct-clan that manipulated water made her even more dangerous when coupled with her deceiving adorableness. The sensei won't know what would hit them.

Like mouse lured into a trap, Kakashi suddenly appeared in the clearing, sauntering towards the tied up genins with utter ease. Just like Obito, he did not have his sharingan activated, presumably didn't see the importance now that the jinchuuriki were not their opponents.

"Hoo, I see you captured two of them," the silver-haired man commented, giving the trapped students an eye smile. "You two have done well, fighting and resisting capture for this long."

Gaara internally swore. So, Kakashi was pulling that card, huh? Play the good cop role to lower their captives' guards down to gain cooperation. The basics of interrogation basics.

"Akane-chan, Taiko-kun," Obito cooed, voice smooth and enticingly placating, "…if you help me capture your friends, I can give you these bells," he coaxed, sitting leisurely in front of the tied students, the bells dangled in front of the genins' eyes.

"You want us to betray our friends?" Akane questioned, her tone was deeply contemplative.

"Yes!" Obito beamed.

"N-no!" Taiko stammered—Gaara could see the boy's anxiety spiked when the jounins shifted their gaze at him. "We're not telling you anything!" surprisingly, Taiko stood his ground, shifting his gaze to Akane, only to lose all of his firmness them, "…right…Akane…?"

Akane's smile darkened.

"Interesting proposal, sensei," she purred, looking like she was really considering the offer. "How kind of you."

Kakashi gave her the pleasant eye-smile again while Obito's grin could practically blind the world.

"AKANE!" Taiko's voice was thick with pure betrayal. "We're not selling our friends!"

"They deserve it!" to the poor boy's surprise, Akane snapped—anger and hatred dripped from each syllable.

Taiko recoiled into himself like he just faced an angry snake.

"Friends? What friends? Look at us, Taiko! Sasuke-kun went off on his own. Sakura-san never consider anyone else that is not Sasuke!" the tied up kunoichi laughed.

Her laughter was hysterics and mad.

It felt a bit too real to be an act.

"Gaara-kun and Naruto-kun are no better!" she hissed, wild and angry. "They worked together, leaving us to fend for ourselves despite them being the strongest of us all…," her voice grew softer as she hung her head low, her hysteric laughter turned manic.

"What can I expect? Monsters would stick to monsters after all."

Gaara physically winced at those words.

It hurt. He knew that it was a ploy, but it was still _painful_.

There were gentle taps on his shoulder and an assuring squeeze. The light weight of Naruto's head on his shoulder was a comforting reminder of their plan.

 _"_ _Forgive me for my words later."_

She has said that during their strategising.

Akane definitely didn't hold back at all. Bless that girl.

Kakashi stared at the maniacally laughing girl, feeling the pity and anger bubbled simultaneously inside him as Akane added on how much she hated the jinchuuriki brothers for causing her to lose her father. He understood from where she was coming, and this genuine hatred in her manic ramble was perfectly justified.

It wasn't fair to the brothers, but it was _justified_.

Obito's eye was troubled even though his encouraging beaming grin remained on his face.

If these kids passed, he would have one hell of teamwork to fix.

"You have a point, Akane-kun," Kakashi said, sauntering towards the trapped girl with a kunai. "You lost your father in the war against Suna, right?" he murmured, his tone was soothing and understanding as he angled the kunai to cut the rope around her. "I understand," he assured. "So, why don't you help us fail your friends?"

Ah, look at Kakashi, casually asking their teammate to betray them.

 _He's horrible…._ Naruto tapped into their link again. _Kakashi-no-niisan is horrible._

Gaara was nodding his agreement when Akane gave out the signal.

"That sounds great, Kakashi-sensei!" the girl cheered, smiling innocently.

Kakashi smiled. He felt a sense of pity for her, considering that she was about to fail this test.

"Ne, sensei."

Kakashi was barely done cutting the rope when Akane suddenly called out—her eyes flashed adorably dangerous.

"Yes, Akane-chan?"

"70% of human body is made of water, right?"

So many things went down at the same time.

Gaara freed his teammates from the ropes—allowing Akane and Taiko to proceed with their plan. Akane weaved a series of rapid hand signs, targeting Kakashi with her family jutsu and turned the silver-haired jounin to her literal puppet.

 _"_ _My sister taught me a special jutsu that allows me to control someone using their own blood. I need to be close to them for it to work though…."_

It worked so damn fine that Gaara almost laughed in disbelief.

When else you would see the genius son of the late White Fang of Konoha being caught off-guard by a genin half his age and one-tenth of his experience? It was so cool it was _unreal_.

While Kakashi was betrayed by his own blood, Obito faced off directly against Taiko and Sakura. The pink-haired genin showed off a delicate yet effective control of her weapons to bind Obito with rope before Taiko enhanced the bind by trapping Obito in Earth restraints.

"Waah….this is _unexpected_ cooperation," the jounin commented, completely at ease, his eye flashed red.

Gaara's sand immediately lashed out as makeshift blindfold—wrapping so tight around the man's eye.

Hey, it sucks to bestow anyone with sand in their eye, but things will get so much harder for the poor genins if sharingan was involved.

"Gaara-kun~!" Obito flat-out whined, as if he wasn't restrained like a war prisoner by his own students. "I don't like sand in my eye!"

"Then, I advised against opening your eye, sensei."

"Awh," the jounin pouted. "You're a closet sadist alright."

Having only his mouth free, Obito's chest inflated as the jounin breathed out large fireballs aimed directly at Taiko, thus causing the shy boy to lose his focus. The earth restraints broke apart without much effort.

Sakura shrieked, holding up her arms as if it would protect her from the fire.

Sasuke jumped in to drag the endangered duo from the ruthless fire, countering Obito's fireball with his own before throwing his _Fuuma shuriken_ towards the man's head.

Despite having a literal sand blindfold, Obito swiftly evaded the fireball and grabbed the shuriken before it could hit his head. The curve of his lips was a mix of impressed and pride. He tilted his head in Kakashi's direction, as if he was trying to listen for his colleague.

"Heh…," Obito breathed out, sounding impressed. "Akane-chan, ever consider on becoming an actress?"

"Hmm…I used to dream of becoming a movie star," Akane huffed, struggling to keep her control over Kakashi's body as Naruto tried to wrestle the bells from the struggling jounin.

"Damn it, Kakashi-no-niisan…," Naruto growled. "Give up, will ya?"

"Sensei," Kakashi corrected, huffing in the mix of pain and effort. "Call me sensei, Naruto."

Naruto growled in annoyance.

Meanwhile, Obito was cheerfully conversing with his students as if he didn't notice Kakashi's struggle.

"Do you think I can make my big break, Obito-sensei?" Akane called out, smiling brightly. "As an actress?"

"Of course you will!" Obito responded to Akane's question cheerfully, inclining his head to his left where Sakura and Sasuke stealthily tried to approach him. "You really had us fooled for a moment there!" he added, throwing the gigantic shuriken towards the pink-haired genin as if his sight was not hindered at all.

Gaara's sand lashed out to protect her from getting a faceful of high-speed gigantic shuriken.

"You have such troublesome jutsu too…," Obito added, tilting his head in Kakashi's direction. "I have never heard Kakashi _that_ out of breath."

"You try having your own blood betray you, Obito…," Kakashi growled, completely disgruntled.

"It is a family jutsu," Akane explained with pride. "I'm still learning, but to be able to restrain Kakashi-sensei…," she smirked, shifting her focus solely on Kakashi. "Even if it is just a little bit, I'm so proud."

"You did great!" Obito cheered, still blindfolded and surrounded by eager genins, but he was still as laidback as ever. "Remind me to treat you later. It is so much fun to see a little girl kicked Kakashi down his high horse."

"Oi, Obito! Which side are you on?!"

"My angelic students, of course~!"

"Tch," Sasuke hissed, leaving Taiko behind as he launched himself towards Obito. "I have had enough of waiting. Old man, you're mine!" he yelled.

Fire, paper bombs and weapons clashed _everywhere_ that Gaara had troubles attempting to keep up with his role to support and protect his friends.

Amid the fireballs and _shurikens_ synonym to a fight between two Uchiha, Sasuke managed to grab one of the bells from Obito the exact same time Naruto broke through Kakashi's defensive grip and took another bell from the jounin's waist.

"Got it!" Both Sasuke and Naruto cheered.

The genins smirked and scattered away as Gaara's sand unleashed to wrap around the jounins' bodies. It was a brief moment of chaos—Gaara may or may not intentionally inflicted pain on their teachers throughout the process—but in the end, Naruto has tossed his bell to Sakura while Sasuke retreated to stand beside Taiko.

Naruto and Gaara walked up to their trapped teachers.

"Time to end this," Naruto purred, cracking his knuckles.

Kakashi closed his eye in a mix of resignation and exasperation.

Gaara exchanged a playful smirk with his foster brother. Whatever that the jounin was thinking, both jinchuuriki knew that the man would be surprised at the end of this.

"Right," Gaara agreed, arms crossed over his chest, face void of emotions as he stood in front Obito.

The long, surprised 'eeeehhhhhhh' after he undid the sand blindfold was worth it.

"Eeeehhhhhhhh?" Obito blinked, his gaze fell on his pinkie finger.

Similarly, Kakashi was making noises of disbelief and bewilderment, his gaze was fixed on his pinkie finger too.

Naruto raised his own pinkie finger, jiggling the bell and the thin string that tied his fingers to Kakashi's own. Obito did the exact same thing—awe and wonder reflected in his sharingan—as he jiggled the bell. A huge grin spread on his face then, and he ended up winding up his pinkie finger with Gaara's the moment he noticed that the other four genins were in the same predicament. Sasuke held Taiko's hand above their heads like champions hauling their victory, the bell he retrieved from Obito tied to both of their pinkie fingers. Similarly, Akane and Sakura flaunted their own interlocked fingers, the bell jiggled to their movements.

"You said it yourself, Kakashi- _sensei_ ," Naruto said, jiggling the bell again. " _Ninja world is harsh. There are rules and laws and those who break those rules are scums_ ," the blonde lowered his voice, mimicking Kakashi's voice.

Gaara raised his interlocked hands, flaunting the bell that tied him and Obito together. "But those who abandon their own friends, are worse than scum," he smiled, nodding to the rest of the genins. "Right?"

If the mask was off, Gaara knew that Kakashi would be gaping like a fish right now.

"Our squad is made up of three genins and one jounin, sensei~" Sakura giggled, seemingly having a kick-out on the teachers' bewilderment.

"Four bells, eight people," Sasuke huffed. "Easy maths."

Kakashi's eyes widened when the genins pulled both teachers into their circle, placing their hands on top of each other—bells shone underneath the sunlight.

"You're part of the team too, sensei," Akane beamed. Beside her, Taiko nodded enthusiastically.

Obito started to tear up.

"We're not going to abandon any of our teammates," the genins stated, almost like a vow. "And that includes both of you, sensei."

Obito promptly wailed and pulled them all into a gigantic group hug.

"My adorable genins!"

If Gaara noticed the glazed look and the moisture that wet the edges of Kakashi's visible eye when the man announced that they all passed the second test with flying colours—

It was none of his business.

* * *

 **A/N : Yaay, they passed! And my busy weeks has started. Hope you have fun with this update. R &R if you have time, please~!**


	14. Chapter 14

Visiting hours in Konoha's General Hospital meant nothing to Gaara.

He preferred the silence of the night, and being practically nocturnal himself, he liked spending his sleepless nights alternating between the graveyard and the hospital. After all, the actual visiting hours were at the same period of time he usually took one of his many naps.

Gaara loved his naps way too much to even consider dragging his ass off whatever surfaces he found himself to curl on for his scheduled naps.

The patch of sunlight on the soft grass near their private training ground was temptingly comfortable to pass. The large hollow curve on the giant tree near the academy seemed to fit his body just right—yet another of his favourite napping place. The little space between a wall and a bookcase at the foreign fiction section of Konoha's Library that was so peaceful Gaara could fell asleep in a blink of an eye. The cool alcove near Nidaime-sama's stone head was a perfect napping place on the hotter day.

Gaara loved his afternoon naps so, naturally, he _had_ to opt for night visits.

Being one of the Hokage's sons meant that he generally has less chance of being scolded whenever he ignored the normal rules. Plus, if there were responsible souls that wished to reprimand him for ignoring the rules, the lingering stigma against jinchuuriki and his bloody past gave him the advantage to simply channel his deadliest glare to the nurse-on-duty and they would instantly leave him alone to prowl in the empty corridors of the hospital.

To be honest, their candid horrified expressions upon meeting his glare were hilarious.

"I would appreciate it if you stop teasing my medical staffs," Minato sighed, shoulders slouched in both exasperation and exhaustion though his eyes softened upon noting the utter glee in the boy's shuddering frame as the night nurses scrambled away from his private ward.

Gaara snorted a silent laugh, closing the door quietly behind him.

Minato sighed—the voice in his mind (that suspiciously sounded like his genius former student) chanted that his boy was a closet sadist and he might have made a mistake on giving his seal of approval to the council's suggestion on assigning Gaara to be under the care of his other (slightly unstable) former student.

"You're supposed to be the mature one between both of my kids," he reminded half-heartedly.

Gaara could almost _hear_ the pout in Minato's voice and couldn't stop the corner of his lips from twitching to a smirk.

"I'm the younger one," the boy deadpanned, pulling the chair beside Minato's bed. "You can't expect maturity from me unless Naruto matured first."

Minato hung his head down in exasperation.

"I have made a huge mistake."

Gaara smiled—it was his more subdued version of Naruto's sunshiny beaming.

"Why did I agree assigning Obito to you?" the Hokage whimpered, burrowing his face to his palms. "He stunted your maturity."

Gaara noted the improving mass of the usually bony hands with a genuine pleased smile.

"Because I'm the only one that could keep an eye on him," the boy responded with a more serious tone, recalling the time Minato has summoned him for a private talk a few days after they celebrated the teams' success of the second genin test in this very room. "Naruto's a blabbermouth, and Kakashi couldn't follow sensei everywhere now that he has his own fixed duty to Team 7."

It was ironic that he was the one being tasked to keep an eye on his own teacher instead of the other way around like he initially thought.

It was no longer a mystery on reasons Kurama was highly uncomfortable around Obito. The man was the one who ripped the bijuu out of Kushina and attempted to control him to destroy the village 12 years ago. Minato has broken that mask of his and stopped him on time back then—at the huge cost of the Hokage's own well-being—but the dark deed has been done, thus justifying Kurama's reasonable wariness of the man's chakra signature.

Obito has changed for the better after over a decade in tight surveillance and constant rehabilitation therapy, but his mere presence in the village triggered restlessness among Minato's council—moreover now that he was granted freedom to reintegrate into the society.

Of course, the freedom came with the condition that someone needed to keep an eye on him until his loyalty to Konoha was proven. Minato has chosen to be transparent by telling Obito that someone would be still keeping an eye on him—not wanting any misunderstanding of distrust to occur if Obito realised that fact on his own—but that was it.

Gaara wondered if it would feel like a betrayal if Obito ever discovered the truth about his supposed watcher.

"He is doing alright, I hope?" Minato asked, the shiver of his voice tittered between the fine line of worries, fear and hope.

"No signs of mad inclination towards destruction and chaos," Gaara reported, slipping into a more serious business-like tone he often used when he wished to differentiate between talking to _Otou-san_ and _Hokage-sama_. "He is behaving and integrating into the society well—much better than me when I first came here, in fact."

"Really?"

Kami-sama saved Gaara's poor soul. How the hell the leader of a shinobi village could sound so pathetically and adorably hopeful was a total mystery. It was adorable—so helplessly adorable—that Gaara would've melted and obliged to each of the man's whim without a second thought.

"If it would make you feel better, he didn't mention anything about the bijuu or even acknowledge them existed inside Naruto and me," Gaara added placatingly. "He had multiple chances to control Shukaku in the last mission, but he didn't do anything that merits any suspicions…," he elaborated, invoking a relieved breath from his adoptive father (Minato didn't agree with that plan _at all_ but he was outvoted by his own council—yeah, sometimes, democracy sucks). "The only slip he has was that one attempt to offer a dango to Shukaku."

Shukaku promptly bristled in annoyance—the lingering aura of betrayal echoed through his link with Gaara—because Gaara has obliged to entertain Obito's attempt back then. That particular post-mission team bonding has ended with an annoyed Shukaku displaying his protests to the innocently offensive attempt of friendliness by half-transforming Gaara and flooding the dango stall with sand.

God bless that the Uchiha was a rich clan with only three breathing members. The compensation fee was _overkill_.

Minato blinked incredulously. "What? _How?_ "

"My teammates were curious about the bijuu…," Gaara started, eyes rolled upwards to stare at the ceiling in his attempts to remember. "…so I told them things that no one normally knows about bijuu—like sometimes Shukaku demanded ridiculously sweet dango that would rot my teeth. Sensei happened to hear us and offered Shukaku one from his own plate…," he smirked humorously, brimming with smugness at the echoes of annoyed betrayal from his bijuu, "…using the doggy talk."

Minato was gaping. "He did _what_?"

"You do realise that your former student is probably suicidal and has few screws loose in his head, right?" Gaara deadpanned.

No sane person would attempt to offer a dango to Shukaku like one would offer a treat to behaving dog. No matter how good Gaara's control over the sand beast was, that was still a suicidal act because Gaara was waay too busy keeping his cool-headed image and _not_ burst out laughing to stop Shukaku from coming out in an annoyed sulky rampage.

"I…," there was a brief pause before, "…I have been informed of that possibility."

"Naruto calls us 'Team Psycho'," Gaara snorted, voice slipping back to the casual tone.

The business part of this visit has ended, and he would very much like to indulge Minato's gluttony on the stories of his children's daily shenanigans. Hokage or not, there wasn't much entertainment that could be provided inside these four white walls of the hospital. Plus, this visit was both his weekly report as the subject of Hokage and also his daily visit as Minato's son.

The air of formality vanished. Minato blinked his ridiculously expressive blue eyes a few times before he burst laughing out loud, his raspy voice sounded genuinely entertained.

"He told me that," the man hummed, eyes softened with adoration. "Ranted for a whole hour about your teammates possessing extremely unique personalities."

Gaara resisted the urge to snort. Minato sugar-coated that way too much. Naruto has no filter whatsoever when it came to affectionately describing Team 12 as the team of demonic psychos that rampaged destruction in their path and left chaos and trauma behind.

They have a reputation.

Gaara _loved_ it.

"Taiko is somewhat normal, though," Gaara pondered out loud. "Between our deranged teacher, Akane's violent side and my sadism tendency…," he huffed, thinking back about the last C-turned-to-A-rank mission—how very deceivingly cheery and harmless his team has looked like to the rogue ninjas—and had to stifle a chuckle of his own. "…well, among all of us, his extreme shyness was the most normal."

"Naruto said that he is not going to trust any woman anymore after sparring with your teammate…," Minato smiled, pausing for a moment with head tilted slightly to the side, "…Akane-kun, I think?"

"It was his fault for falling for the basics of basics kunoichi's deceiving technique," Gaara scowled in disbelieving annoyance.

All that Akane needed to do was to fall on her knees and shed some tears to have Naruto hesitated mid-spar.

The jointed training of Team 7 and Team 12 was highly entertaining to watch.

"You would've thought that he would learn something after seeing her deceiving _Kakashi_ ," he grumbled under his breath. "That girl is a demon."

Gaara smiled fondly when Minato snorted another laugh. Pale green eyes flickered briefly towards the clock on the wall before Gaara exhaled a long sigh. Wordlessly, he manoeuvred Minato to lie properly on the bed, tucking the man in the comfort of the white blanket the exact same way Minato has done to him when he was far younger.

This time, the Hokage flat-out pouted at him, but Gaara's stern grimace subdued the incoming protest as the man simply burrowed himself more comfortably in the blanket.

Gaara hesitated for a moment.

Then, he leant down to kiss the Hokage's forehead.

Minato's eye widened for the briefest of a moment before it crinkled in pure joy, his lips stretched to a huge grin that showed his pearly teeth while one of his skinny hand reached out to give the boy eternal bed-hair—the IV needles pricking his veins be damned. Gaara flushed a bit, just a faint pink tint on his pale skin but it seemed to skyrocket Minato's mood.

The red-haired boy acceptingly resigned to his fate when Minato pulled him in to cuddle on the bed.

"I'm happy that you're getting along with your friends," the Hokage's breath was warm against Gaara's hair, his voice was slightly muffled. "You have a duty to the village," he added, voice firm with forced resolve. "But do remember that the bonds you have matter the most, okay?"

"Uh…?"

What was it with Hokage and their tendency of saying cryptic words?

"I love you. Naruto loves you. Your team loves you. Your late uncle truly loves you. I'm sure if Kushina is here, she would love you too," Minato exhaled a deep breath, nuzzling his nose to the tuft of red hair. "The librarian that always found you sleeping between his bookshelves. The owner of the dango stall. The gardeners of the Academy. Teuchi-san and Ayame-san. Yamanaka-san too," he listed the people down, chuckling. "You have created lots of bonds, Gaara."

Confused, Gaara gingerly patted the man's back, allowing Minato to pull him even closer until his cheek pressed up the soft fabric of the man's shirt and he was close enough to hear the rhythmic beats of Minato's heart. Minato's fingers threaded through his hair with practiced ease, occasionally patting the back of his head.

Gaara wondered what the hell all of this was about.

"Obito and Kakashi nominated all six of you for the upcoming Chuunin Exam."

Oh. So that was it.

"Will Suna be sending any genins?" Gaara said, deciding to not beat around the bush.

Despite the shaky relationship between Suna and Konoha after the war to retrieve Gaara, few business interactions still remain between the two villages. It wasn't like there were any other choices. Minato was firm in his decision to fix their broken alliance, while Suna was trapped in a tight spot considering that Konoha was the only village with enough resources that was willing to engage in fair trade with them.

The importance of getting resources overshadowed the bitter feeling of losing their ultimate weapon to Konoha—or at least that was what everyone seemed to think as the wary trade continued.

"They will only be sending one team of three," Minato hummed, his arms around Gaara instantly tightened.

"Who?" Gaara mumbled, despite knowing two-third of the answer.

"You know that is a classified information."

"You asked Naruto's and my opinions about the village's security when we were eleven," Gaara deadpanned. " _After_ showing us the original plan."

Minato blinked. Then, he laughed sheepishly.

"Ahahahaha…"

"That is even more of a classified information, _Otou-san_."

"You see…," Minato grimaced. "The bijuu inside you have lived for centuries," he said, clearing his throat a few times as if it was enough to mask his nervousness. "All four of you have been getting along so well… and Naruto always said that Kurama and Shukaku are as much of Konoha's citizen as everyone else, so—"

The pleased warmth that fluttered inside his chest, was definitely _not_ from Gaara.

 _What the hell, Shukaku?_

"—so I thought, since they are technically the oldest in the village, they are like our elders, and if they wanted to part their wisdom to us the younger ones, they could do so through both of you…"

Shukaku was purring.

Gaara levelled his most disbelieving gaze at Minato.

"Anyway, Suna's team consisted of your elder brother and sister, Kankurou and Temari," Minato quickly blabbered (really, Naruto's blabbermouth was a genetic trait), "…if you want to know."

There was a beat of silence.

"I thought that was a classified information?"

Minato spluttered with what was left of his goofball dignity.

Gaara reached out to pat the top of the blonde head like the Hokage was the child and he was the mature adult. "There, there," he said teasingly. "No need to fluster yourself, Otou-san."

"Gaara!"

Gaara planted another kiss on the Hokage's forehead before backflipping off the bed and straight out of the window. He ran home, feeling more elated than ever, letting the wind that accompanied him reminded him of the embrace of long-lost siblings.

He has severed bonds to fix.

* * *

 **A/N: I'm estimating around 2 - 4 more chapters before this is completed. I honestly enjoyed imagining Team Obito as Team Psychos. Naruto feared their jointed training. Also, the Yamanaka-san mentioned is Ino's mom, since Gaara was her regular customer by now. I don't know what Inoichi's wife name is.  
**


	15. Chapter 15

"Gaara-kun?" Taiko's confused voice snapped Gaara from the view of the endless spread of gold horizon he was currently focusing on. "What are you doing?"

Gaara didn't move from his lounging spot against the tree but simply rolled his right eye to look at his teammate. Taiko was staring at him with pursed lips and puzzled gaze, holding two separate plates in his hands. The boy clearly has considered Gaara's needs for food, since they have endured a long and tiring morning of harsh training. In the background, Akane was berating Obito, swatting the teacher's grabby hand away from the dessert.

"Sensei!" the girl berated, abusing Obito's hand with the rice ladle again. "Eat your lunch first, then dessert."

"But the cookies look so good!"

"You'd ruin your appetite if you consume sweets first."

"Akane-chaaaan!"

Gaara smiled at the scene, honestly wondering since when they have fallen to this familial dynamic. It was barely a few months since they become an official team, but their bonds right now felt very much like an actual family.

A family consisting of an exasperated single mother and three sons(?).

Not surprisingly, their sensei was the one who acted like the spoiled youngest child.

Anyway, he praised Taiko for suggesting pot-luck for their lunches. It definitely brought the team together.

"Gaara-kun?"

Gaara shifted his gaze back to his least crazy teammate, left eye still closed shut. "I'm looking for information."

"Information?" the smaller boy tilted his head in confusion but when Gaara didn't elaborate, he didn't push any further.

Instead, he sat next to Gaara and offered one of the plates to him.

Both of them were pointedly ignoring the way Obito was attempting to sway Akane's firmness with his pleading and teary eye.

"No," the girl huffed with an air of finality, shoving the lunch plate into Obito's hands before physically dragged the man by his collar to the tree Gaara and Taiko were currently sitting under. "You're supposed to be the adult. Have some dignity, sensei."

Obito pouted.

Gaara chuckled but said nothing as they fell into the familiar routine of small talks. Akane was leading the conversation with the current news—which basically centred on the upcoming Chuunin Exam, and the progress of their academy peers. Her network of gossips and information told them that most of their peers were nominated for the Chuunin Exam too, and they ought to expect the stronger version of their friends. Her network also told her snippets of news that there were few of their seniors that would be joining the exam, thus expanding the landscape of competition they would have in this exam.

Her gaze occasionally flickered to Gaara's closed eye, but she too, remained silent.

"I have yet to find anything about candidates from other villages," Akane sighed after a rather long elaboration on Team Asuma's rapid progress, eyeing their petulantly sulking teacher before she gave in and offered the cookie container to the man. "Obito-sensei, do you know anything?"

Permission granted, Obito stuffed his mouth with the cookies and chewed exaggeratingly slow.

Akane's brows twitched, her lips curled to a foreboding smile.

"Sensei…," she purred.

Sensing the incoming outburst, Taiko started to sweat, shifting his gaze frantically between the teacher and the kunoichi, before shooting Gaara a pleading look.

"Suna only sends one team," Gaara swooped in to save the day, voice calm and controlled despite the elated excitement that bloomed in his chest. "Two of them are the Kazekage's children."

Two sets of eyes stared at him with surprise while a single dark eye flickered grimly.

"Kazekage's children…," Taiko murmured, lowering his gaze and started picking on his vegetables. "So that would mean they're…"

"My elder siblings," Gaara said—voice remained calm, left eye still closed shut to provide his brain with the approaching view of bleak buildings made of golden-brown stones. "Temari and Kankurou."

"The last time you see them…," Akane started, leaning forward over her plate. "Were they strong?"

Gaara inhaled, pressing his index finger to his temple as his brain was flooded with images upon images of the place he once called home. Long-distance spying was a tedious task, but it was worth the effort when his third-eye reached one of the sandy training grounds.

Gaara watched his sister—a blooming kunoichi now—as she wielded a gigantic fan with practiced ease, forcing the rebellious wind of Suna to yield to her prowess like the mistress of the wind she was.

Gaara saw his brother—no longer sporting any resemblance to the Kazekage with his expressive face paint—as he wielded his passion and obliterated the training dummies in an artful performance of a puppet master.

Gaara quirked a fond smile, the images faded as he slowly opened his left eye.

 _They have grown so much._

"They are stronger now," he hummed, pride and worries grew and clashed within his chest.

Pride, because it was so satisfying to see how strong his blood siblings has grown.

Worries, because they might still hate him, and their reunion won't be as positive as he hoped for.

Though, these concerns won't stop him from trying to mend their severed bonds.

The determination to regain his other siblings led him to the business district of Konoha a week later, his mind was set on the peace-offering gifts for his siblings. It was late—the sun was spilling splashes of reddish orange and purple far on the horizon—but the district was still bustling with people. Civilians and shinobi alike flooded the streets, haggling and bargaining for goods.

"Gaara-kun?" the surprised voice had Gaara to shift his attention from the senbon displays to the daughter of the weapon merchant.

"Tenten-san," he greeted with a polite bow of his head.

"I don't recall we have any orders from the Hokage," Tenten said, the briefest of panic flickered in her eyes that Gaara could imagine her brain working out the lists of custom orders the shop received. "Do we? I'm sure that the Hokage's orders are always on our top priority—"

He knew that she was about to frantically went through the log book where she usually jotted down customer's orders. He has been here frequent enough while on an errand for Minato or simply restocking his own tools to know her business habits. Plus, she was one of the few seniors assigned to be specialized tutors for weak students (in his case, it was his weaponry skills) back then during his first year in the academy.

"No, no, no," Gaara assured her, stopping the older girl from scrambling to the counter. "Tou-san didn't order anything. I'm just….looking… _around_."

God, that was awkward.

She used to coddle him back then, cooing over his awkward grip on the kunai, or giggling at the wrong way he held the shurikens. His dependence on his sand and the lack of willing people to train him in Suna has made him the shame of shinobi world-wide during his weaponry classes. It was a good thing he has a kind-hearted senior that patiently tutored him until he was able to catch up with his peers in the weaponry department.

It was too bad that their friendship didn't last when she advanced in grades and graduated.

Upon Gaara's words, Tenten visibly deflated, placing a hand on her chest with a deep exhale of breath.

"For a moment there I thought I have forgotten the Hokage's orders…," she muttered, looking like she just lost a good decade of her life. "That would surely be bad for business…," she sighed, but almost the next second, she bounced back to her normally cheery self, clasping her hands together in front of her chest. "Then, Gaara-kun. How may I assist you today?"

Gaara hesitated, the folded scraps of paper in his pocket suddenly felt much heavier.

Shukaku said that he was overdoing it, but everyone else was very supportive of his efforts. Naruto threw in lots of ideas the moment he found out about Gaara's little project, spending his spare time sitting on Gaara's table as the red-haired boy sketched all night long. Minato caught a wind of his project (presumably from Naruto's blabbering mouth), and approximately at 3 in the morning, Gaara received a pair of ANBU at his window. The agents silently handed him a bunch of rare scrolls that only a Hokage would have access to.

Gaara snuck Minato his favourite snacks during his next visit. He also used his jinchuuriki charms (aka glares of death) to distract the nurses as his father stuffed his face with the snacks.

Minato gave him eternal bedhair (again), not even complaining about the trauma Gaara has surely inflicted on his staffs.

Kakashi randomly appeared the day Gaara was stuck on the mechanics of his project; Obito was hanging lazily off his shoulders with a wide grin spread across his scarred face. The silver-haired man has claimed his perch on the windowsill, while Obito made himself at home on Gaara's bed. The one-eyed Uchiha was behaving exactly like Naruto typically would—making a mess of a cocoon out of the bedsheets, completely unrepentant even with deadly jinchuuriki's glare zoned on him. Both men accompanied him for a few hours, inputting their experience and knowledge to help Gaara with his project.

Obito slipped him a small scrap of paper, winking deviously before they left through the window—his limbs wrapped around Kakashi's torso like a spoiled Onbaa, hiding his giggles against the fabric of Kakashi's jacket.

The paper was a recipe for a very potent poison along with its antidote—written with precise details complete with symbols and emojis.

Gaara recognized few herbs that his limited knowledge knew as extremely toxic to the human body, and he suddenly had an ominous hunch to never consume anything from his teacher whenever he pissed Obito off during training.

The man had access to _odourless_ , _tasteless_ **_and_** _colourless_ poison.

Sometimes, Gaara forgot that his teacher used to be an S-ranked criminal.

In the end, Gaara managed to complete his designs in a week.

Now, he was contemplating between giving his full effort and ask Tenten to teach him how to turn his designs into reality, or simply paid the master to complete the job.

His current family were the type of people who freaked out and swooned upon receiving handmade items, no matter how meagre or visually unappealing the gifts were.

Gaara wasn't so sure about his old family.

Squaring his shoulders, Gaara shoved the folded papers to Tenten, hoping so hard that the weapon mistress did not laugh at him as he requested with a voice so uncharacteristically meek and hopeful;

"Is it possible for you to teach me to make these?"

Tenten went silent for a long time. Her warm brown eyes were fixed on the papers with full concentration, delicate fingers roughened with harsh practice traced all over the graphite lines, scrutinizing every details and mechanics. Gaara waited with baited anticipation, only barely able to restrain himself from fidgeting.

Then, Tenten looked up and gave him a wide smile. Her hand landed on Gaara's head, ruffling his already messy hair—the warmth and playfulness were comfortingly familiar.

"You have come to the right person," she grinned, eyes gleaming with excitement. "Tenten-nee is going to help you."

The old nickname brought forth old memories that warmed his chest and reminded him of a similar-looking girl with piercing green eyes, lighter hair and twice amount of hairdo.

Gaara missed his sister.

* * *

 **A/N: Don't you love it when your traitorous insane brother is so worked up to meet you again he ended up designing a handmade gifts for you as a peace-offering reunion gift? Adorable, isn't he?**

 **Let's hope a certain Kage didn't fuck their reunion up.**


	16. Chapter 16

"I demand a date if these babies ended up being used against me."

Gaara dropped the metal he was polishing, only barely able to save it with his sand moments before it hit the floor. He felt heat rose up to his cheeks, pointedly avoiding looking at the weapon mistress while chanting unspoken gratitude in his mind.

Tenten definitely caught him off guard there.

To his annoyance, Shukaku cackled madly through their link, having no mercy whatsoever at his host—the tanuki was practically howling in laughter, having the time of his life over his host's misery.

Gaara would blame the flush of his cheeks to the heat of her workshop. Yes, it was definitely the scorching heat from the burning furnace in this workshop that caused Gaara to flush _pink_. After all, he has left Suna long enough to not be immune to heat as Suna shinobi usually would.

 ** _"Rrrrriiiiighhhhtttt_** _,"_ Shukaku snorted.

 _Shut up, tanuki._

He was _twelve_ going into his thirteenth years of life.

If anything, he blamed this on the curse of pre-teens. Yes, it was definitely because of the accursed _puberty_ all of the genins his age was currently going through.

 _Heat_ plus _white shirt_ plus vigorous works that produced _sweat_ on the figure of a distractingly attractive older female—said female was leaning over the table, showing a hint of her tantalising skin—was NOT a good combo.

Nuh'uh. As weird as it was, that was definitely NOT a good combo.

Tenten wore that sleeveless white shirt and loose shinobi pants almost every time Gaara saw her at the shop. It was her casual outfit. She wore that all the time. He never even noticed how distractingly attractive she looked like in those before. _Never_.

 _Why now?_

 ** _"Welcome to puberty, brat."_**

Cue the howls of laughter that echoed in his mind.

Gaara wondered if he could ever gag Shukaku into temporary silence. The tanuki was constantly making unnecessary and unhelpful comments ever since Gaara started noticing the attractiveness and cuteness of people around him.

It was _annoying_. Shukaku was annoying. Everyone was annoying for suddenly being so attractive.

Not Gaara's fault that everyone suddenly looked attractive or cute.

 ** _"Keh. At least this one is better-looking than the Inuzuka mutt."_**

Gaara suppressed an annoyed sigh. That one time he blatantly commented on Kiba's adorableness and his bijuu refused to let him live that down. So what? He thought the way Kiba was rolling around with Akamaru was adorable enough to warrant a compliment. What was so weird with that?

 ** _"You poked his cheeks, smiled and called him cute. That is not normal for you."_**

 _So what? Dogs are cute._

 ** _"God damn it, brat."_**

Gaara huffed and tried to tune out his bijuu from his thoughts. The more he entertained the bijuu, the more annoying Shukaku will become. Plus, not everyone was aware that he was constantly talking to his bijuu, and there was no need to freak Tenten out with his weird jinchuuriki perks.

 ** _"Brat."_**

Gaara ignored him.

Though he couldn't deny that he did found Tenten attractive…which made it worse because a part of his mind still equated her to Temari—a sisterly figure in his life—and she probably thought the same of him, considering that she occasionally slipped into the old nickname of Tenten-nee.

This was wrong. It was dreadfully wrong.

He would be better off having a gigantic crush on Obito like Akane was—wait…

That was even _worse_.

The jounin was over a decade older than them and was a former criminal that once tried to destroy the village. Obito was the reason Minato lost his wife and Naruto grew up without a mother. He was an S-ranked criminal who was not entirely stable with his own moods.

Sometimes Gaara questioned the sanity of the only female in his team.

Like, _why_?

But it probably made sense considering that Obito was showing masochistic tendencies and Akane was openly a _sadist._

 ** _"Imagine the demon spawn that bastard Uchiha and the water brat would create."_**

Gaara really wanted to gag Shukaku into permanent silence.

 _Shukaku NO._

Gaara hissed to his bijuu, completely horrified.

 ** _"They would create hell."_**

Apparently, Shukaku did not realise that his commentary was not wanted.

 _Obito is our **sensei**. He is over a decade older than us. A. Decade._

 ** _"Meh, age is just_** **_numbers.._**."

That was it. Gaara knew that he was going to lose his sleep for at least a week. His team was filled with insane psychos. He did not need the images that Shukaku was trying to feed into his mind. By the love of Kami-sama, where even did the bijuu found the amount of imagination needed to show Gaara these compromising fantasies of student-teacher relationship between his sensei and his teammate?

Gaara considered to suffocate himself to temporary unconsciousness when Shukaku started showing images of Akane climbing Obito up like a tree in extremely inappropriate and compromising situations.

 _Jerk._

 ** _"It's my responsibility to make sure that you have healthy fantasy of a teenage boy."_**

 _Fuck off, Shukaku._

Gaara tried to block his link with the bijuu, not wanting anymore weird imageries reached into his fairly untainted mind. Akane's crush on Obito was just a phase. Those two would not end up together and created hell spawns for Konoha. No no no. The weird crush was just the effects of the puberty—they were growing teenagers after all.

It was just a _phase_.

In conclusion, puberty is weird.

Tenten giggled, flicking a finger to Gaara's forehead playfully as she climbed up the work table, taking the spot next to the boy, her legs dangled over the edge of the work table. She reached out for the metal that was loosely held by Gaara's sand and spread the polished frame open, dark eyes scrutinised the half-completed weapon with a master's gaze.

"I think this is good enough," she said, nodding thoughtfully. "You said that she manipulated wind?"

"Yes," Gaara nodded, offering the other half of the pair to Tenten. "But she already has a giant fan as her main weapon."

"The confrontational type, I guess?" Tenten tipped her head, bouncing off the table with a graceful leap.

"Temari is never fond of stealth," Gaara murmured, taking a seat on the stool. "She likes it big and grand."

"Then, it would be good for her if she occasionally slipped into stealth. She would have that element of surprise," Tenten hummed, shaking her head with an amused laughter. "I can't believe I'm doing this. I might end up facing against her during the Chuunin exam and I'm going to be beaten up good by the weapon I helped to forge."

"Ah," Gaara breathed out, honestly have forgotten to consider that possibility.

Gaara was about to apologise when Tenten promptly straightened up to a combat-ready form. Her eyes were focused, her breathing calm and the flow of her chakra felt vibrant and alive as she slipped into a kata. The muscles of her toned arms were relaxed and loose, making it looked like the unfinished fans in her hands were simply an extension of her body.

Then, she moved.

It was just the basic taijutsu—Gaara vaguely recalled that her team consisted of seniors and a jounin instructor that were heavily-oriented with hands-on combat—but the way she weaved the fans into her movements made it looked like a lethal dance instead. She twisted and dodged like she was engaged in a battle; her movements were so fluid that Gaara couldn't take his eyes off her—he was simply too fascinated to even blink.

Gaara imagined Temari in her place, weaving the smaller fans with ease and grace, the wind yielding to her wish, sending surprises to unsuspecting enemies who expected to meet a barrage of massive wind instead of this smaller, much more precise one.

He hoped this was enough of a reunion gift to allow him the meager chance of fixing their severed bond.

Tenten ended her test run with a swift flick of her wrists, sending sharp senbon that shot out of the fan's frames to impale the walls.

"Whoa," Tenten breathed, slightly breathless as she looked at the unfinished fans with awe. " _That_ was one hell of a good design," she blinked, looking a bit dazed herself as she snapped the fans—opening and closing the frames as if to test the fluidity of the movements. "You sure you don't want to work part-time here, Gaara-kun? Or partner with me, even? This is good. You're a hella good designer."

Gaara flushed pink again, but he couldn't help but preen at the praise.

He was glad. He did put a lot of thoughts on this design.

It was for his sister, after all.

"Partnership sounds good," Gaara responded without thinking but didn't find it in him to take back his words.

He had way too much fun designing new weapons for his blood siblings. These pair of deadly fans for Temari, and that full set of weapons he painstakingly designed so that it could be used in Kankurou's puppets—he had fun researching and designing everything, as well as spending his times forging them with Tenten.

Partnership did sound good.

There was a sudden movement he barely noticed—Gaara felt Shukaku restrained their sand with brimming smugness and cocky amusement—and before he could react, he had a face full of white fabric. He could feel the slightest hint of the damp skin against his cheek as the older girl engulfed him in a hug.

Blood rushed to his face while his body frozen in mortified shock and Shukaku was _laughing_ at him—that blasted tanuki—as Gaara tried so hard to not be a creep when he felt the softness of her breasts pressing up to his collarbone and her strangely nice scent invaded his senses. She was all softness lined with hard muscles of constant training—something that he only noticed recently for some godforsaken reasons.

"Yosh, let's run my old man bankrupt with our brilliant partnership!"

Gaara regretted that he was obliged to go through puberty like every other normal teen.

 _Why can't I be **not** normal for once?_

* * *

 **A/N: This chapter was not in the plan. It was not even in the extended plan I created from the original 'one-shot'. So, to that person who fed me with the idea of Gaara going through puberty's awkwardness...I BLAME YOU. You know who you are and I BLAME YOU. I BLAME YOOOUUUU.**

 **(I low-key ship Gaara/Tenten, but since Neji is alive, that ship is not gonna sail because Neji/Tenten is my life.)**

 **And there was no ship. Every crush and attraction in this chapter is a phase of growing up. Obito is already taken, y'all. You could see it in the previous chapters. Conflicts of interest was the reason Gaara was the one who have to keep an eye on him instead of the other possible candidate.**

 **Hope you enjoy reading this crackish update as much I amuse myself writing it. It has been such a stressful week for me and this was a good relaxation.**

 **R &R and thank you for reading!**


	17. Chapter 17

Fear. Horror. Confusion. Utter mindfuck.

Gaara saw those emotions flickered in his siblings' eyes, one after another. Their now confused gaze flitted between him, Naruto, and the little boy who has attached himself to Gaara's waist. Temari and Kankurou stared a bit too long at the small black-haired boy who was hiding his snotty face against Gaara's white jacket.

"Huuu…," Konohamaru whimpered, tightening his arms around Gaara's waist. "Gaara-no-niichan…Naruto-no-niichan."

Gaara distractingly picked Konohamaru up, cradling the smaller boy close to him. Konohamaru indeed has more liking to Naruto when it came to playtime or training, but if it was to seek protection, he went to Gaara first, knowing that the red-haired boy has better defence and intimidating presence than anyone else (and also the fact that Gaara scared Ebisu senseless). The Sandaime's grandson willingly curled against Gaara's chest, small fingers tightened in the white fabric of Gaara's jacket, face buried against the older boy's maroon undershirt—the small child seemingly no longer wanted to put up with his fearless front.

Konohamaru was a shivering mess in Gaara's arms.

Whatever that Kankurou has done to scare the kid, it was definitely working.

Gaara shifted his weight slightly to support Konohamaru's mass, but the movements were misinterpreted by the Suna-nin, causing both Temari and Kankurou to make horrified choked noises and assumed defensive stances.

Naruto's vibrant blue eye flickered briefly between Gaara and the sand genins, and Gaara instantly knew that his blonde brother was picking up the family resemblance—the green eyes and pale skin of the Kazekage's bloodline—and made the appropriate conclusion.

"Well, I didn't expect you guys to be bullies," the blonde jinchuuriki huffed, crossing his arms over his chest. "The way Gaara talked about you guys—he made it sounds like you're really good people, y'know?" he growled, the weight of Kurama's voice intoned into his own.

Temari visibly flinched, her hand went straight to her fan, shoulders tensed in a combative crouch.

Kankurou, on the other hand, was staring at the way Konohamaru so comfortably clung on Gaara. The puppeteer's eyes were wary, but there was something else brimming in those eyes too—something _warm_ and _hopeful._

"Jinchuuriki," Temari hissed, eyeing Naruto warily.

Naruto scowled. "You didn't deserve Gaara," he hissed, stepping in front of Gaara and Konohamaru. "You definitely did not deserve my brother's love."

Kankurou jerked back, his painted face scrunched up painfully as if Naruto's words have physically wounded him.

Beside him, Temari pursed her lips, her hands were still on the base of her fan, though the tensed wariness in her eyes faded to distressed bafflement.

Gaara tried to not take their reactions to his heart. He knew that they weren't going to have a smooth reunion, but he had hoped it would be more civil with less animosity than this.

His chest hurt, though.

Gaara avoided meeting his siblings' gaze and shifted his gaze to the lone genin behind Kankurou and Temari. It was obvious that the shaking genin was the spare Suna has decided to send to complete the three-man team requirement of the exam. Poor guy didn't look like he belonged among the Kazekage's children at all. Thus, Gaara decided to ease up the boy's tension. Despite the pain in his chest, Gaara formed a gentle smile, trying to look less intimidating and more welcoming to the terrified genin.

"Welcome to Konoha," he greeted with a slight bow, ignoring the shocked gasps from Temari and that genin. "As the son of the Hokage, I express our gratitude that you accept our invitation."

The diplomat among the jinchuuriki brothers—Namikaze Gaara, the Hokage's youngest son. Yep. That was his political role in Konoha.

When he dared to look at his siblings again, Temari seemed reasonably confused and baffled, while Kankurou looked like he was stuck in the middle of gaping in surprise and leaping in joy.

Though, no one was able to say anything when the improved mood was ruined with three cold words.

"There you are."

Gaara stiffened upon hearing the new voice behind him, a violent shiver racked through his body. He didn't dare to turn around, no, not when the fear was so overwhelming he was halfway to hyperventilating. He subconsciously tightened his arms around Konohamaru, wanting to distract himself from the incoming panic. The dread and horror slowly engulfed him, pulling him into long-abandoned memories of golden dust weighing him down, of gold dust wrapping around him to suffocate him to death. He remembered the cold gaze he saw through his own tears, the heartless voice that willed his death and Gaara just _froze_.

Konohamaru's arms tightened around his body as if offering some form of support.

Then, he felt the weight of Naruto's arm around his shoulders, Kurama's chakra reached out to him through his brother's skin, the exact time Shukaku purred through their link—this time it was a soothing purr, as strange as it was.

He was not alone and defenceless now—that was what they were trying to say.

"Naruto. Gaara. Konohamaru-chan"

Like a dam being released, the much warmer voice flooded Gaara with the sense of safety. He turned around, fixing his gaze on Minato's warm blue eyes and exhaled a deep breath of relief as the fear faded away. Minato seemed to understand his fear, as the Hokage subtlely flared his chakra to touch Gaara's own, earning a confused glance from his Kage companion and an amused huff from his own bodyguard.

Gaara breathed a little bit easier upon feeling the gentle touch of Minato's chakra.

Minato looked so much better and stronger these days—well, perhaps he did look a bit older than his age, but he at least he didn't look like he was halfway to the afterlife. Gaara couldn't praise the gods and deities enough for Jiraiya's success on persuading the Shodai's granddaughter home. Tsunade outright refused to allow Minato to hand the hat to her. Instead, she vowed to remain in Konoha to help the Yondaime heal as well as taking over the position as the main instructor for Konoha's medical course as an exchange for not being the Godaime Hokage.

It worked out well because Jiraiya has chosen to stay too.

Speaking of the pervert himself...Standing just slightly behind the smiling Hokage, the white-haired Ero Sennin stood regal and cautious, spreading a powerful aura of legendary sannin and the Hokage's bodyguard he was.

Jiraiya honestly made the Kazekage's bodyguard looked like a wimp.

"Tou-san," Gaara greeted with a genuine smile, bowing in Minato's direction and pointedly not looking at the Kazekage, all the while he was pretending not hearing the scandalous gasps from all Suna shinobi present. "You're showing Kazekage-sama around?"

It was a low blow, and probably a bad thing for Konoha's politic with Suna, but Gaara thought he reserved the right to be petty. Rasa deserved that.

Plus, if another war was to break out, Gaara was proud to fight as a Konoha shinobi. He was sure that the war would be to their advantage. With Yondaime Hokage now regaining the strength of his prime, Sandaime-sama still breathing and alive and very much willing to fight to defend their home, and not to mention that two of the legendary sannin were home in Konoha and didn't show any signs of leaving again.

Add that to Gaara's own sensei—the one half of Twin Blades of Konoha—and every other war veteran of the Third Shinobi War that were still in active service, plus the two jinchuuriki who have been steadily improving along with their bijuus whom by now has a seat of their own in Minato's council and very much happy to be acknowledged as a proper citizen of highest standing in Konoha…

Declaring a war on Konoha would be a suicide attack at this point.

"Yes," Minato beamed brightly, though his eyes did dart in Rasa's direction as if anticipating the other Kage's reaction. "Would you be so kind to do the same with Suna's team too?" he gestured to Temari and Kankurou—both were staring at Minato like he was some form of god that just descended from heaven. "You could invite them for a meal with your friends. I'll cover the tab."

"You have friends?!"

Naruto openly groaned while Minato winced. Beside the Hokage, Jiraiya rolled his eyes.

Gaara grimaced. It has been years since he last saw his youngest son, and the first thing Rasa said to Gaara was this. How civil his sire was.

"I do, sir," Gaara decided to be civil to his sire, just for Minato's sake. "My brother and I will be sure to keep your children safe while Tou-san showed you around," he added automatically, tipping his head in Naruto's direction, not even thinking how that would sound to everyone else.

He basically just disowned the Kazekage in front of everyone.

Rasa blinked at him in wrathful disbelief.

Kankurou looked… _hurt_. Behind the puppeteer, Temari has a downcast contemplative look, but not as openly hurt like Kankurou.

"Umm…," Minato started, tension bled from his voice though he did looked like he was trying to ease up the tensed air as quickly as possible. "Kazekage-sama, may we proceed? There are still things that we need to discuss," he said, almost forcefully leading the other Kage away.

Gaara felt something from his bijuu link, and only had a second to realise what was going on before Shukaku took over his body.

"Minato," Shukaku's voice purred from Gaara's mouth, successfully halting Minato on his track.

The reaction from all Suna's shinobi was instantaneous. The Kazekage's bodyguards quickly leapt in front of their Kage in offensive combative stance. Temari whipped out her fan while Rasa assumed a combat form, golden dust hovered around him ominously.

Meanwhile, all Konoha shinobi just stared at them like they were overreacting to something so minor.

"Yes, Shukaku-sama?" Minato asked, his tone was casual yet still maintained a degree of respect.

Rasa stared at Minato like he thought that the Hokage was insane.

"Regarding the things we discuss in the last meeting," Shukaku purred, tipping Gaara's head in Naruto's direction. "Kyuubi and I have some suggestions. We'll have the brats send the reports to you later."

Shocked gasps erupted from all Suna shinobi present.

Minato, on the other hand, has slipped into Hokage mode, completely oblivious to the utter bafflement of his guests.

"The council appreciates your input, Shukaku-sama. Kurama-sama," the Hokage said dutifully, bowing in respect to both bijuus. "I'll read the reports and will present it to the rest of the council in the next meeting."

"Keh," Kurama huffed, using Naruto as his mouthpiece. "You said it yourself, Minato. We're citizens of Konoha too," Naruto's eyes flashed red as he angled a fanged feral grin in the Kazekage's direction. "Any threat to Konoha or our brats will be treated like threats against us personally. Understand?"

Kurama didn't even bother to be subtle.

Rasa visibly paled.

"Of course, Kurama-sama," Minato bowed again, nodding respectfully.

"As your elders, we're obliged to ensure the safety of our brats and our home," Shukaku added in a purr so oddly gentle that it caused every Suna shinobi there to shiver in fear. "Inform us when you hold the next council meeting will ya?"

"Yes, sirs," Minato nodded, internally dying at the idea that these two just made his diplomatic job harder.

Rasa stared at Minato in disbelief. His shocked gaze then shifted to the two jinchuuriki, eyes widened as he watched the boys' eyes changed from the unnatural demonic eyes to pale green and vibrant blue.

He took approximately two seconds to erupt;

"YOU HAVE THE BIJUU IN YOUR COUNCIL?"

"Yes?" Minato blinked, a bit taken aback and confused. "I mean, yes, I have them in my council," he clarified, firmer this time. "They're old and powerful, so I named them as Konoha's elders alongside with the founder clans' leaders."

The Kazekage stared at him like he was a madman.

"You're insane," Rasa finally blurted out.

Then, he stalked away, his white robe billowing behind him.

Minato sighed, pressing his face into his palms with utter exasperation. Though, when Gaara reached out to pat his arm, he lifted his head with a genuine smile and extended his hands to ruffle both of his sons' hair, smiling gently at the boys before he chased after the Kazekage with rushed steps.

"Kazekage-sama!" he yelled. "The Hokage Tower is in the other direction!"

Gaara and Naruto exchanged an amused gaze before bursting out to unison laughter.

Needless to say, seeing Gaara's genuine laughter invoked mixed reactions from the Suna team. The nameless spare genin looked like he has died twice over and now was confused whether he was in hell or heaven, while Temari narrowed her eyes in wariness towards the jinchuuriki. The blonde kunoichi has her hands rested on her hips instead on her fan, but the tension still bled from her shoulders, her eyes were impossibly grim.

Though, Kankurou has a different kind of reaction.

His painted face lit up with so much hope that it looked like he was attempting to rival the sun. The Kazekage's middle child eyed the way Gaara was protectively cradling Konohamaru, before the tiniest quirk of a smile made its way on his face. The puppeteer then tentatively walked up towards Gaara, meeting his brother's hopeful pale eyes with grim determination. Kankurou halted just inches beside Gaara and tapped on Konohamaru's shoulders. The older boy offered his palm to the quivering child and waited patiently until the boy peeked at him with terrified eyes.

Konohamaru's eyes widened in confused curiousity when he saw the sweets in Kankurou's palm.

"Sorry for scaring you, brat," Kankurou mumbled, nodding encouragingly when Konohamaru reached out for the sweets. "I was…wrong jan."

He was staring into Gaara's pale eyes as he said that, the emotions were heavy in his eyes—regret, hope, confusion and more hope—making Gaara's breath hitched in his throat.

Gaara set Konohamaru down, murmuring soft soothing words when the boy resisted. He eventually managed to calm Konohamaru down enough that the boy finally let go of his shoulders to trot away. The Sandaime's grandson cheerfully waved goodbye at him and Naruto before trotting off, but the red-haired jinchuuriki wasn't paying attention to him. Instead, Gaara has his hopeful gaze fixed on Kankurou's face, not daring to hope but couldn't help but pray for at least an acknowledgement from his older brother.

Then, very very tentatively, Kankurou's bigger palm rested on Gaara's head, ruffling his red hair with uncharacteristic gentleness and warmth.

This time, Gaara dared to hope.

* * *

 **A/N: What is this? A double update? Guess who is procrastinating? Meeeee.**

 **This is the previously actual Chapter 16, now Chapter 17. Rasa is currently torn between breaking off Suna's already shaky relationship with the insane land called Konoha, or attempted to retrieve Shukaku back.**

 **Both won't be fruitful to Suna at all. Hahahahaha.**

 **Yes, we're nearing the end! Read and review, guys!**


	18. Temari

Temari was uncomfortable.

Gaara knew that the moment Minato offered his guest rooms to the Kazekage's children. Said Kazekage has left Konoha without even seeking for his kids—his departure only made known when Minato crashed their pre-exam genin party and informed the foreign siblings regarding their father's whereabouts. The Hokage has winced upon seeing the downcast expressions on Temari and Kankurou's faces, hence his impromptu offer for the siblings to stay in his guest rooms until the exam started.

Almost into his late-thirties and Minato was still impulsively protective when it came to sad children.

Kankurou was grateful and overjoyed at the offer—and he made his gratitude clear by slinging one of his arms over Naruto's shoulders as the duo hunched close in a devious conspiring manner all the way up the stairs to Naruto's room. They were instant friends, despite the few years of the age gap and the different citizenship. Once Kankurou showed that he would very much like to rekindle with Gaara, the blonde jinchuuriki has instantly opened up to the older boy, bonding over the spirit of mischievous pranksters and adoring niisan of the red-headed.

Gaara shuddered in stifled horror. Kami-sama saved his soul—now there were _two_ of them.

Temari, on the other hand, was tensed and wary.

Gaara watched as she tentatively arranged her shoes at the front door, almost tip-toeing into the Hokage's manor as if she wasn't sure she was truly welcomed into the threshold or not—her gaze occasionally flickered to Gaara, although it was with more confusion and less hostility this time.

"I'll be back late tonight," Minato announced, ruffling Gaara's hair again. "There are some leftovers in the fridge if you don't feel like cooking. Or you can have some food delivered."

"I'll cook," Gaara assured, folding his white jacket and left it on the side table next to the sofa. "Expect a bunshin to deliver your dinner around 8."

Minato beamed brightly before he vanished from their sight.

Temari's gasp was filled with awe and wonder.

Gaara turned around to face his sister, lips quirked to tiniest of a hesitant smile. "Hiraishin," he stated like it explained everything.

"Yellow Flash of Konoha," she murmured, her gaze still fixed at the spot Minato was standing on seconds ago. "I've heard about the other two, Orange and Red—the Fiery Lightnings of Konoha—they were his apprentices, the spies said…," Temari gasped, clamping her hands over her mouth as if she wasn't supposed to say that.

"No worries," Gaara waved one hand dismissively. "It is not exactly a secret. We're aware that there were spies. Plus, it's not like we're subtle with our Hiraishin training. Tou-san couldn't stop gloating in pride."

Temari stared at him with eyes so wide she almost looked horrified.

Gaara snorted. "Red," he pointed to his own hair, smiling teasingly as he waggled his index finger upstairs where Naruto's voice could be heard booming with Kankurou's laughter. "And that awful please-kill-me-orange-jumpsuit."

There was a beat of silence for the information to sink in before;

"You played us," Temari accused.

"It is a good political intimidation, isn't it?" Gaara countered, sauntering around the counter, only reappearing to Temari's view once he had securely tied the apron around his waist. "You seem less enthusiastic to attack Konoha after that."

"That…"

"Ask the spies to check out Training Ground 4 if you wanna lose more motivation," Gaara hummed, giving a quick wink to his sister. "Naruto and I practised with our bijuu there."

Temari blanched.

Gaara barely able to remind himself that Temari wasn't used to the idea of harmless bijuu training. Bijuu was equal to destruction to her. She also has never seen Gaara's mischievous side, hence his teasing might be interpreted as threats. The Kazekage was strict with his children, emphasising discipline and demanding absolute obedience from them all. On the other hand, the Hokage was a pretty lenient parent—if that one incident involving the father and sons that gave Jiraiya a matching hair shade with Sakura was any evidence.

Gaara's upbringing in Konoha allowed him to easily slip into teasing and jokes—as questionable as his sense of humour was—but it must have been a surprise to Temari, who probably only remembered him as a bloodthirsty uncontrollable monster.

Oh, the differences that loving parenting would make.

He picked up the knife and tried so hard to not feel offended when Temari tensed up in wariness. It hurt, but he wasn't about to waste the chance Naruto and Kankurou have offered to him for having this alone time with Temari. Gaara silently handed the knife to his sister, offering the handle first to her.

"Help me cook dinner?" he asked, tilting his head in the direction of the kitchen.

Temari startled as if she wasn't expecting that out of all things but seemed to oblige Gaara's invitation anyway. She trotted behind the younger boy, casting wary and awed gaze as they entered the threshold of Minato's kitchen. Gaara was humming as he opened the fridge, taking out the ingredients with practised ease and was completely oblivious to Temari's contemplative stare aimed at the back of his head.

"You have changed," the blonde kunoichi stated, letting her shoulders slumped in defeat. "I don't even know which one is the real you."

She didn't need to elaborate for Gaara to understand her meaning.

Gaara smiled a gentle soft smile. He placed the ingredients on the counter and sauntered next to his sister, leaning his back against the edge of the wood. He wanted to throw his arm around her shoulders—much like he was so used to do with Naruto—but he knew that it wouldn't work out well. She wasn't used to this version of Gaara.

She has only had the chance to know the bloodthirsty Gaara.

"I'm both," Gaara started, fixing his gaze on his fingers despite knowing that Temari's head has snapped up to stare at him. "I won't deny my past….my mistakes, my slips—because it would mean that I'm abandoning those who have died in my hands," he sighed, wringing his fingers nervously. "But I've grown," he quirked a fond smile, remembering all those awkward years building his trust to Minato. All those years stumbling after Naruto in making friendship with his classmates and these recent couples of months learning the true meaning of comrade bond.

He has _grown_.

"I was nurtured with love instead of hate. I learnt to smile, laugh and forgive. I get into troubles and mischiefs," he huffed a short laugh near the end of his words. "I learnt to grow…," he said, lifting his face up to stare into his sister's widened eyes, "…as a human."

Temari gaped.

"Tou-san raised me right," Gaara smiled fondly, stealing a glance to the picture of Minato and Kushina on the living room's walls. "He did his best, and I think I grew to become a better person than the monster I was."

They fell into the silence again.

"The Hokage looked like a nice person," Temari finally said, placing the knife in her hand on the counter.

"He is," Gaara agreed, fondness brimmed in his voice. "I have grown, and so are you," he added, quirking a lazy smile that seemed to fluster Temari. "I wish you'd allow me to know you now."

Gaara exhaled a deep breath, summoning courage from everywhere he could before he added with a voice so soft it was barely audible;

"I miss my sister."

Temari looked away, body trembling.

Though, nothing could describe Gaara's joy when he felt tentative arms wrapped around his waist as Temari's cheek pressed against his temple. It was a quick hug that ended just as abrupt as it started, but it was a beginning for both of them.

"Kankurou missed you," Temari said, moving away so that Gaara could only see her tensed back. "He didn't cope well after the war ended and the troop returned without you."

Gaara hummed in acknowledgement.

"How about you, Temari?"

Temari exhaled a deep breath and she slowly turned around. She fixed her gaze on Gaara's pale green eyes, fat droplets of tears spilt from her eyes down her cheek.

"I don't know," she whimpered, and her dam broke. "I really don't know," she sobbed, crying louder. "Father said that you betrayed Suna. You and Uncle Yashamaru are traitors to our people. He said that you fought our own people to protect Konoha's shinobi," her voice was hindered with hiccups and occasional high wails. "Traitor. My brother is a traitor."

Gaara squeezed his eyes shut. "I did. I did that. I am a traitor to Suna,' he admitted. He regretted nothing, but he wondered if it could have gone differently.

"I was mad. You're supposed to be our village's strength—but," Temari hiccupped, hiding her eyes behind her sleeves. "But I look at you now—," she shuddered, voice cracking. "You're _normal_. I saw the way you look at Naruto and the Hokage. You truly loved them. You have friends— _a whole class of them_ —and, and the children adored you! You…," she broke to a hysterical laugh. "You—you're in a pink apron cooking dinner for everyone, for crying out loud!"

To be honest, this was Minato's apron. Gaara refused to take credit for this horrid colour.

"It felt like my world is being turned upside down, y'know?" she whimpered, voice growing softer. "It felt like we betrayed you first," she hiccuped, voice pitching higher and borderline hysterics. "It could have been _Temari-nee_ instead of _Tenten-nee_. It could've been you and Kankurou pranking Baki instead of you and Naruto pranking that Copy Ninja…," Temari started to wail, losing all of her composure as the weight of her regret dragged her down. "You could've looked at _me_ and _Kankurou_ with those eyes and said that you love _us_. You could've been in _our_ kitchen cooking _us_ dinner. It should've been _me_ that reached out to protect you! This…," she rambled, casting a forlorn look around the house. "This family, this _life…_ it could have been _ours_."

Gaara closed his eyes, non-existent brows pinched to a regretful frown.

"We were the one who turned you into a monster that we fear," Temari hiccupped, giggling brokenly. "It's our fault all along. Kankurou was right—we turned our adorable brother into a _monster_."

Having enough of her wrongly-inflicted guilt, Gaara reached out to pull her into a hug.

To his relief, she melted and curled against his smaller body, wetting the front of his shirt, fingers fisting on the maroon fabric tightly. Gaara cradled his sister tight to his chest, letting she spill her heart and regret out. He threaded his fingers through her hair, toying with the band that was keeping her hair up. He tentatively planted a kiss to her temple and brimmed with happiness and relief when she didn't resist.

"Forgive me, neechan," Gaara murmured softly, melting into her warmth with a sigh when she returned his embrace.

"Forgive _us_ , otoutou."

And Gaara smiled. _Brightly._

* * *

 **A/N : Kankurou is next. And maybe an epilogue. I'm not sure if I want to throw individual chapters for Minato and Naruto or not. What do you think? Should I?**


	19. Kankurou

Kankurou missed him.

Temari has mentioned that to him, but she didn't elaborate.

Now Gaara knew why she looked so pained when the topic was brought up.

Kankurou didn't cope well after losing Gaara.

He really didn't. The face paint was the beginning. Kankurou blamed Rasa for losing Gaara to Konoha. The older boy was so mad at the Kazekage, that he has tried to maim his own face because he refused to bear any resemblance to the man who has cast away his little brother.

Gaara has to brace himself on the counter when Temari mournfully told him that.

Then, Kankurou's rebellion was followed by his choice of jutsu.

Only Temari knew that Kankurou has inherited the sand-wielding kekkei genkai too. He was a late bloomer, but he possessed the ability to wield sand just like his father and little brother.

But he never used it.

He buried that ability in the same hole he buried Gaara's clothes—a grave that marked his lost brother after Rasa announced that he was disowning Gaara and declared his youngest son as a traitor to their village.

Kankurou then vowed to never use his sand again and religiously turned his hobby to his speciality.

A few years in the future—when Suna has swallowed their pride to gain the benefits of alliance with Konoha and Rasa has reluctantly retracted the order to kill-on-sight that he imposed on Gaara and Yashamaru so that they could peacefully send a team for the Chuunin Exam as the start of the rekindling alliance—Gaara finally learnt the extent of Kankurou's pain.

He just returned from late night sparring with Temari—the talk he had with her has opened a new door for them to rebuild their sibling bond. They promptly decided to test Temari's new fans after they dropped the bento at Minato's office. It was as fun as it was when he was training with Naruto and Kakashi—the exhilarating feeling of sparring against a cherished sibling was something that Gaara treasured.

They arrived home, Temari bid him goodnight with a kiss on the forehead before closing the door of her room as Gaara made his way down the hall to check on his brothers.

Naruto, was (not surprisingly) half-dangling over his bed, snoring and drooling on the frog pillow he still holds when he slept.

Gaara peeked into Kankurou's room, only to freeze upon seeing that his brother was not alone.

"I'm _mad_ ," Kankurou murmured to his companion, voice thick with sorrow. "I'm so mad."

Gaara watched his brother's companion tilted its little head as if asking what was wrong.

"I'm supposed to be his brother, y'know?" Kankurou sighed, reaching out a hand to stroke his silent companion's hair. "I'm supposed to be the one that protects him from harm…yet, the fox brat did a much better job."

Gaara startled. Kankurou thought that much of him?

"The way he stood in front of Gaara…no hesitance whatsoever, like…like he would willingly go against the world and die for _him_ —I wish I have the same courage," Kankurou sighed again. "I wish I have the courage to go against the Kazekage and protect him," he whimpered, regret dripped from each syllable. "I envied him. I envied Naruto."

Kankurou's companion shifted a bit, moving into the moonlight that spilt from the window.

Gaara's breath hitched in his throat.

"I wish I could have been a better niisan," Kankurou whimpered—there was no mistaking of the crack of his voice and the deep regret that spilt into his words. "I wish I could protect him from harm like Naruto did. I wish we have a good father like Hokage-sama…," the sobs were audible now, as Gaara watched the hollow sockets of the puppet seemed to stare straight into Kankurou's soul. "I wish I'm not so useless!"

The chakra string snapped upon his angry outburst and the puppet fell onto the floor.

Gaara stared at the puppet Kankurou was talking to. He steeled his nerves, taking in the small pale body—that could be easily mistaken as a real one under such dim lighting—and the tuft of vibrant red hair on the puppet's head, to the empty sockets where Gaara knew that pale green glass eyes were supposed to go.

Kankurou was talking to Gaara's puppet.

The small puppet was an exact replica of a much younger Gaara—a frozen silhouette of what Gaara looked like the day Yashamaru took him and ran to seek refuge in Konoha. Apart from the absent eyes, Gaara honestly felt like someone has transported his younger self from the past and let it crumple on the floor of Minato's guest room in front of his mourning brother.

Kankurou didn't slack off on the details.

He also definitely wasn't coping well.

"Kankurou," Gaara greeted, pushing the door open.

Kankurou stiffened, before promptly dabbing his eyes with his own sleeves.

"Hey, otoutou," Kankurou greeted back, voice hoarse. "You had fun with the spar?"

"We did," Gaara admitted, taking the spot on the floor in front of Kankurou. He cradled his puppet form on his lap, reaching out one of his hand to rest on Kankurou's knees. "Wish you could join us."

Kankurou snorted. "I won't be able to catch up."

"We don't know that," Gaara hummed, staring into the soulless sockets of the puppet's eyes. _Why?_

 _Why would you even bother?_

"I couldn't find the right shade," Kankurou murmured, noticing Gaara's confusion, his voice was empty and blank. "I couldn't…I couldn't remember the colour of your eyes."

Gaara's breath hitched, his fingers curled tighter on Kankurou's knees—not enough to hurt, but enough to ground his brother to the reality.

"I couldn't remember your eyes too," Gaara murmured, not even knowing if he has made the right choice to console his brother.

He usually left the consoling to Minato, or in desperate times when Minato was not available, Naruto.

"You're better off like that," Kankurou snorted humourlessly. "I look like _him_."

The last word was spat with so much hatred it would make the bijuu's hatred towards humanity seemed small.

"But I remember _you_ ," Gaara said, shifting so that he could lean his head against Kankurou's knees. "I remember my brother. I remember my brother and his bright smile. I remember my brother and his ridiculous requests of sand sculptures," he huffed a silent laugh that resonated with Kankurou's humourous snort. "I remember my brother who kept eating my food…"

Gaara paused, remembering his lessons with Tsunade—remembering the bitter scent of poisonous herbs that throughout his life he had thought were the scent of _spices_ —and he slowly fixed his gaze to Kankurou's eyes, the realisation dawned on him.

It was a horrible realisation.

"…even though you knew that it was poisoned."

Gaara said that in a soft disbelieving breath.

Kankurou blanched.

"You _knew_?" Kankurou stammered.

"I just realised it…," Gaara exhaled a deep breath, sending prayers of gratitude that Kankurou was still alive after all of these time. "Tsuna-baachan demanded us all to have lessons on poison. I just realised that the spices I hate so much are poisons."

Kankurou didn't even bother to hide his relieved breath. "Thank goodness someone has the sense to teach you that knowledge."

"Why?"

"Knowledge on poisons is important jan," Kankurou stated light-heartedly, placing his hand atop Gaara's own on his knee.

" _Why_?" Gaara pressed again, knowing that Kankurou was trying to evade the actual topic.

Kankurou's humourous smile dropped, his head hung low as he pointedly avoiding Gaara's gaze.

"Because that's the only thing I could do for you jan."

"Kankurou…"

"I'm not a leader like Temari," Kankurou said, silencing Gaara with a hand in the air. "She is a natural leader. She would have the chance to fix things about you once _Rasa_ kicked the bucket and she took the hat," he huffed a fond smile. "I'm not strong like Naruto to be able to watch your back, but…," he smiled grimly, placing a hand on Gaara's head. "But I'm sure as hell willing to die to protect you just like him."

"Don't—" Gaara started.

He was not okay with anyone else dying for him. _Especially_ his family.

"That's the only thing I can do back then," Kankurou cut him off. "I learnt about poison. I studied them. I know how they worked and how to resist them…," he sighed softly. "That's the only thing I can do for you."

Gaara stood, placing his puppet on the chair before he captured his stupid, idiotic elder brother into an embrace.

Kankurou stiffened in the embrace but when he returned the hug, it felt like he would never let go.

"Idiot," Gaara murmured to Kankurou's hair. "You, stupid loveable idiot."

"Basic requirement to be your niisan," Kankurou retorted, voice lighter now. "Naruto's an idiot too."

"Oh, hell," Gaara humoured him, letting Kankurou pulled him closer. "There are two of you now," he said in a mock horror. "You and Naruto are going to drive me crazy."

Kankurou laughed. Then, Gaara felt Kankurou shifted, his ear pressed up against Gaara's chest, painted eyes fluttered close to the sound of Gaara's heartbeats.

"You're alive," he murmured softly, shoulders finally relaxed like a burden has just been removed from him. "You're alive," he said again, pressing closer to Gaara's chest. "You're _alive_ and _happy_."

Gaara smiled and hugged his brother tighter. "I am now."

His gaze then fell to his eyeless puppets and the box of the weapons he forged for Kankurou on the table.

"Kankurou," he called, staring contemplatively at the puppet.

"What is it, jan?"

"Let's complete that puppet."

Kankurou stiffened, shoulders rigid with tension as air of panicked desperation emitted from his posture. "I'm not using him in battles. He needs to stay out of danger," he said, almost sounding hysterically defensive. "I'm not letting any harm fall on him."

Something inside Gaara's chest twisted painfully upon hearing that.

If there were doubts that Kankurou has been using this puppet as Gaara's replacement before, those doubts were gone now.

It pained Gaara to witness the frantic desperation in Kankurou's body.

Kankurou wanted to keep that puppet safe.

Kankurou wanted to keep _him_ safe.

"But what if he wanted to fight alongside you?" Gaara suggested, looking down to catch Kankurou's frantic gaze. "What if _I_ want to fight side by side with you?"

Kankurou gaped like an idiot for a split second. Then, his expression shifted to one of grim determination.

Gaara saw a flicker of movement, before a tendril of golden sand— the native of Suna, unlike Gaara's current sand that has earthier colour rather than gold—slithered from Kankurou's toolbox to form a small gourd behind the small puppet.

"Then he would be well-prepared with everything I have before he even goes into any battle."

Gaara wondered if he just made the upcoming Chuunin Exam far more difficult for his friends.

He probably did just that, but honestly, Gaara couldn't care less.

He has gotten his elder brother back.

His family is finally complete.

* * *

 **A/N: I know, I know. I'm on roll this weekend. But hell, this is better than me yelling "FUCK RESPONSIBILITIES!" out of my balcony and caused my neighbors to call the police on me. I'm procrastinating, and I'm gonna suffer the consequences tomorrow. Lol  
**

 **I may be biased but Kankurou definitely is the sibling that loved Gaara more, even in the original series. Temari is more reserved with her love, in my opinion.**

 **Epilogue is coming right up. And probably an extra bonus chapter of the lost moments that didn't make the cut.  
**


	20. Chuunin Exam

**A/N: I lied. This is not the epilogue.** **This is the snippets of what happened during the Chuunin Exam.**

* * *

"Gaara-kun~!"

Gaara grimaced—half in guilt and half in fear—as Tenten waved cheerfully towards him with a smile so bright to make her appearance looked scary enough to terrify the Shukaku jinchuuriki. Tenten's clothes were in tatters, splattered with blood from the senbon impaling her limbs while one of her buns have come undone, thus leaving half of her brown locks flowing down her shoulders. Her multitude number of weapons were scattered all over the battle arena, save for the clear circle around her opponent. Standing directly opposite to her, Temari stood regally with the air of smug triumph surrounding her. The Suna kunoichi was fanning herself with the very weapon that Tenten has helped to forge—which also the very weapon that has caused the injuries on the weapon mistress.

Tenten ripped the senbon off her arms.

"Gaara-kun!" she called, voice terribly cheerful.

"Yes?" Gaara half-squeaked.

He winced as Tenten leapt onto the bar in front of him—the girl was leaning towards him in all of her bloody and injured glory.

Her wounds looked painful.

She looked _creepy._

Then, Tenten giggled and leant close to peck Gaara's cheek.

"You owe me a date."

Gaara flushed pink.

His traitorous brothers promptly cheered and whooped—Kankurou and Naruto were practically clinging to each other in a mess of teasing laughter—even when an angry barrage of wind wrecked the arena and knocked Tenten off balance.

"STAY AWAY FROM MY INNOCENT BABY BROTHER!"

Nobody noticed the seething Neji.

* * *

"Blame Gaara."

Gaara let out a heavy, loud sigh.

"I didn't do anything," he retorted half-heartedly.

"Blame Gaara~" Naruto sang.

Gaara pinched the bridge of his nose.

Shikamaru narrowed his eyes at the red-haired boy, before shifting his gaze to the walls of the arena where the cracks from Temari's previous battles taunted them. His annoyed gaze eventually fixed on the current battle, of which a miniature Gaara was crushing an Oto shinobi without a scrap of mercy. Kankurou was standing just a few steps behind the tiny Gaara, looking like he was doing nothing although keen sense would see the chakra string connecting him and the miniature Gaara.

Golden sand formed a suffocating ball around the wheezing Oto shinobi.

"Yield," Kankurou said, voice grim as he nodded at the miniature Gaara and the golden sand that now was shimmering with faint wisps of movements. "Yield, and I'll give you the antidote."

Apparently, Kankurou has found a creative way to use the poison recipe Gaara has given to him.

Shikamaru turned his head to give Gaara an accusing look. "You had to make our life complicated, didn't you?"

Gaara sighed. "Technically, the poison is Obito-sensei's idea…"

His defensive words were interrupted by a giggly cheer from the jounin behind him;

"You still make this exam harder for your friends with that, Gaara-kun~!"

Gaara contemplated to gag Obito with his sand.

"This is your fault," the Nara heir muttered.

"Blame Gaara~" Naruto giggled, almost sounding like he was singing.

"I didn't mean to—"

He was cut off with a loud announcement from the proctor;

"The winner is Kankurou from Hidden Village of Sand!"

Shikamaru directed an incredibly unimpressed glare towards Gaara;

"Troublesome."

* * *

"Lee-senpai, _come on_."

"I will not yield."

"And I don't want you to get hurt!"

Lee's eyes burned with the metaphorical flame of youth. "Are you looking down on me, kouhai?"

Gaara facepalmed.

"Senpai…"

"I trained you in taijutsu!"

"And you're about to use a forbidden technique that will kill you!" Gaara yelled back, exasperated. "It is not worth killing yourself. This is just an exam, for Shodai's sake!"

Above them, on the audience' platform, Kankurou leant over the railings with a huge grin of pride bloomed on his face. That was his little brother down there. His little brother whom the whole Suna population still considered as a monster.

And Gaara was now _gently_ restraining his opponent to stop the green weirdo from using a dangerous forbidden technique.

Kankurou couldn't be any prouder.

He probably would hug the Hokage later. Yes. Yondaime Hokage deserved lots and lots of hugs for raising his baby brother like this. Gaara has grown wonderfully. Is Hokage-sama available to adopt more kids into his household? Kankurou would love to have a taste of having that kind of awesome father.

"I'll let you go if you do not use _that_ technique," Gaara negotiated, a diplomat as he was. "Fight me in the normal, _less dangerous_ way."

Lee went into a thoughtful silence for a moment.

"I will not use my sand," Gaara offered.

As if to prove his point, he left his gourd against the wall along with his white jacket and maroon long-sleeved shirt, leaving him in his lighter mesh shirt. Returning to his previous position, Gaara slipped into the beginning of a taijutsu kata.

"Let's do it like this," he cracked a tiny smile. "Taijutsu only?"

Lee beamed. "Deal!"

Gaara released his sand and promptly braced himself from Lee's whirlwind kick. He was pushed a good few metres back, his sand armour cracked on a few places but the grin on his face was as elated as Lee's when he returned the attack with similar kind of intensity. They engaged in a ferocious hands-on battle—cracking Gaara's sand armour and giving bruises to each other—but the elated grin never left their faces.

Gaara's sand armour was almost gone, bluish bruises scattered all over his pale skin when their long-drawn physical battle reached the end.

Lee was far stronger when it came to taijutsu, but Gaara has a trick up his sleeves.

He spent good quality times with Tsuna-baachan after all.

It was merely something that he tried out of curiousity. Gaara didn't see the faults on trying out new things. Like, Nidaime-sama tried out lots of new stuff (some were even borderline ethically dubious), and if his idol can do it, why can't Gaara?

So Gaara tentatively requested Tsunade to teach him a thing or two.

She has been hinting on him to take up medical ninjutsu since then. Her argument was that the massive reserves of chakra he has, his almost perfect control over his chakra every time he wielded his sand, and the fact that his sand made it so difficult for him to get killed in the frontlines made him a perfect candidate to be a medic-nin.

Tsunade also said that his forehead was so empty (what with his lack of eyebrows) that a purple diamond marking at the centre would be good for his looks.

He was still thinking about it, acknowledging her points that his ultimate defence would be advantageous as a frontline medic-nin but he didn't know if he would have the ability to _heal_.

He was a murderer after all. Nothing could erase the innocent blood in his hands.

Regardless, the taijutsu spar with Tsunade was exhilarating.

Gaara grinned, focusing his chakra on his fist.

Then, he slammed his fist onto the ground and completely obliterated the floor.

Lee fell into the cracks, trapped for good.

The arena went into a dumbfounded silence before the surprised disbelief erupted;

"ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!"

Gaara looked up to give his shocked brothers a chiding look;

" _Language_ , you two."

* * *

"Orochimaru is still hiding among us."

It always felt weird when he saw Minato from Shukaku's eyes, but this summons—and _this_ information in particular—was addressed to Kurama and Shukaku, since they both were the highest-ranking elders of Konoha. When the summons for the bijuu came to Gaara in the form of two masked ANBU, Gaara knew that Minato considered this issue as very serious.

Thus, Gaara sat meditatively in their shared mindscape, listening in to the discussion between the present members of the Elder's Council. This was a rather impromptu call of a meeting since the failed kidnapping incident and the fight between the four of them against Orochimaru in the Forest of Death has yet to be exposed to the public. Even among the council, the incident was only known to Minato, the bijuu and their jinchuuriki, as well as the Uchiha's Clan Head.

Typically, during a high-ranked meeting like this, the bijuu would take over the control of the jinchuuriki's bodies while the boys would watch from their shared mindscape.

"Keh," Kurama snorted, using Naruto as his mouthpiece. "The snake brat is aiming for the sharingan. Of course he is not giving up early. Nothing surprising there."

"I should have crushed him and feasted on his blood," Shukaku grumbled, sending waves of annoyed aura through the mindscape where Gaara was. "If only a certain someone would let me…"

Gaara rolled his eyes.

"I would appreciate it if you did not do so, Shukaku-sama," Minato said, half-pleading and half-exasperated. "He used to be a hero of Konoha. Perhaps he still could be persuaded to return to us."

Shukaku snorted, while Kurama rolled Naruto's eyes so hard that Minato visibly winced at the sight.

"Your brat said the same thing, Minato," the fox beast huffed, red eyes fluttered shut with a hint of exasperated fondness. "The toad brat told him about what happened to Orochimaru's clan, and your brat now is determined to save the rascal snake."

Minato blinked dumbly.

"Fine, fine you annoying brat," Kurama huffed, sounding like he was talking to himself—although Gaara knew better. When he opened the gleaming red eyes again, the grin he carved on Naruto's face was both determined and feral. "I won't kill the snake….," a pause and another roll of the red eyes before, "…and we'll keep an eye on the Uchiha brat too," Kurama huffed, sounding like he couldn't care less.

Gaara could feel Naruto's smug beaming from their jinchuuriki link and has to hold back his own amusement upon knowing that Kurama's decision was heavily influenced by Naruto's optimism to save both the Uchiha's Clan Heir and also the Rogue Sannin.

"Shukaku-sama. Kurama-sama," it was not the Hokage who responded to the promise, but instead, the response came from the only Clan Head present in the meeting room. "I humbly offer my utmost gratitude to both of you, as well as Gaara-sama and Naruto-sama," the young man said, his forehead touching the cold floor. "I would have lost my only brother if the four of you weren't there."

"Finally," Kurama huffed. "An Uchiha who is not insane and know manners," he angled his feral fanged grin towards the kneeling Clan Head. "There is still hope for your clan, kid."

Itachi stood and bowed his head respectfully.

"Any updates on the curse mark, Minato?" Shukaku barked, demanding the Hokage's attention instantly.

"As for now, I can only curb it with another seal," Minato admitted, frustration and regret dripped from his voice. "…but to get rid of it completely…It is beyond my current knowledge."

"Hokage-sama," Itachi interjected, a faint smile on his face—the stress line from the kidnapping attempt made him look aged and tired.

Gaara pitied the young man. Uchiha Itachi grew into the responsibilities of a Clan Head too fast that he looked far older than his actual age. Poor guy.

"Thank you so much, sir," the Uchiha Clan Head said, smiling gratefully. "For helping my brother."

"I didn't solve anything, Itachi-kun," Minato said softly. "We don't know what the curse mark would do to Sasuke, even with my seal curbing its power."

"But it is far better than nothing, sir."

Minato sighed exasperatedly.

"Try looking through the Uzumaki's fuuinjutsu," Kurama suggested in an uncaring huff. "They have one for everything."

Gaara perked up at that knowledge.

Naruto's clan was known for their amazing use and creation of seals—the specialty of both of Gaara's idols, Minato and the Nidaime. Gaara was already on his sixth re-reading of Nidaime-sama's works, thus the name Uzumaki meant more to him than simply being his brother's last name. The Uzumaki has been credited a lot in the Nidaime's works—almost in every single one of the complicated jutsu—but Gaara has yet to find any scrolls that belonged to the lost clan.

He wanted to know _more_.

"Nobody knows where they hide their knowledge," Minato murmured, wiping his brows and closing his eyes—the stress lines were more visible on his face now. "I've looked through the related scrolls that we do have, but Nidaime-sama didn't disclose anything more than the ones he used in his jutsu creations," he ended with a heavy sigh. "Nobody knows where the Uzumaki hid their knowledge."

"I know."

Every eye promptly zoned onto Kurama.

"Naruto knows about it too," the fox added, not even bothering to hide his smugness. "We found it while exploring the ruins."

Gaara perked up even more. _Yes yes yes yes yes._

Naruto sent a pleading aura through their jinchuuriki link.

 _Gaara, please…._ , the blonde's voice reached him through their link. _Please, brother, NO._

 _Naruto, you love me, don't you?_

 _Not enough to spend the whole night reading ancient scrolls!_ Naruto whined.

 _Pretty please?_ Gaara pleaded. _For your kawaii otoutou?_

 _THERE IS NOTHING CUTE ABOUT YOU, YOU MANIPULATIVE ADORABLE PSYCHO._

 _I'll cook you ramen for a month?_

Naruto went silent for a moment before he cracked and let out a long-suffering sigh.

Gaara smiled, sensing the reluctant acceptance from his blonde brother.

 _I hate you, Gaara._

 _I love you too, brother._

* * *

Naruto went off for an incentive training with Jiraiya.

It was a month break before the finals of Chuunin Exam. With Minato being swamped with works and the investigation of Orochimaru's threat to the Clan Heir of the Uchiha, and also Konoha in general, Naruto has sought for Jiraiya to train. There was no way in hell the blonde was going to laze around when people has been betting over his match with the Hyuuga's genius. Naruto would train to death to kick Neji off his high horse.

Jiraiya has agreed.

Naturally, since the Toad Sage secured one of Konoha's jinchuuriki as his disciple, his fellow Sannin refused to feel left out.

Thus, Gaara was left with no choice when Tsunade literally destroyed Minato's front door and dragged the Hokage's youngest son out of his bed straight to the medical wing of the advanced training centre in the Hokage's Tower.

Minato couldn't do anything but stared at the unfolding scene in utter bafflement and helplessness.

"You just kidnapped the Hokage's son."

Tsunade huffed and rolled her eyes. "Minato saw I drag you out. It is not kidnapping."

"You caught Tou-san off guard."

Tsunade ignored him in favour of rummaging through the scrolls on the shelves. When she handed him a few scrolls, her face was set with grim determination.

"Read them," she ordered.

Gaara leveled his most unimpressed stare towards his pseudo-grandmother.

Tsunade scowled.

"I know you like reading and researching," she huffed. "Your notebooks are filled with notes on granduncle's works."

"That is a breach of privacy, baachan," Gaara hummed, the noise was playful and teasing as he sat cross-legged on the carpeted floor. "I can't believe you invaded the privacy of your grandson's room."

Tsunade crinkled her nose, lips curled into an annoyed scowl, but she sassed back. "I was looking for your porn collection, boy," she grinned. "For blackmail purposes."

"That's why we indulged those things at sensei's house," Gaara hummed off-handedly.

Tsunade almost broke the wall and hunt for both Kakashi and Obito when she noticed the slight upturn of Gaara's smirk. The Sannin frowned at being teased by a child but leant her head on Gaara's shoulder anyway as she plopped on the floor to curl next to him.

"I'm not having Jiraiya gloating over training one of our jinchuuriki," she growled, perhaps a bit too competitively. Her head was still resting on the boy's shoulder, eyes closed with the briefest hints of anger on her face. "The things that we can teach you with your large amount of chakra is endless."

Gaara tilted his head, glancing at the huffing Sannin.

"With your chakra reserves, you could have summoned all of Lady Katsuyu's body from Shikaku Forest," she explained with a pout, shifting her head to meet his gaze. Then, she tapped on the scrolls she has selected for him. "Read."

This time, Gaara obeyed the order. He unrolled the scroll to start his reading.

If Tsunade thought he has the potential to be a medic-nin, who was he to challenge a Sannin's opinion?

* * *

 _A month later..._

"I went for a one-month training with Ero Sennin and you decided to get a matching tattoo with baachan?"

"It is not a tattoo."

"I thought we're getting our first tattoo together?"

"Naruto, it is not a tattoo."

"Traitor."

"Naruto!"

"Lalalalalala, I didn't hear you, traitor."

"I told you that it is not a tattoo!"

"Go to your baachan and see if I care!"

Gaara facepalmed.

Tsunade fell off her couch laughing.

* * *

 **A/N: I'm sorry, but it was an extremely stressful week for me. I want to write something funny, so this comes to be instead of the epilogue. This is the snippets covering the first part of their Chuunin Exam. You know, the Forest of Death, the one-on-one fight and the one month break before the final round. There is a second part of this snippets, before the actual epilogue.**

 **Gaara didn't have the 'Love' kanji on his forehead because he has already have too much love from his family in Konoha.**


	21. Konoha's Invasion

**A/N: This is also not the epilogue. This is the second half of the snippets, covering the finals of the Chuunin Exam and the Konoha Invasion. At least how it happened in this AU.**

* * *

"Nice tattoo."

Naruto huffed sulkily, breezing pass Shikamaru as Gaara facepalmed again and sighed.

"Why do you need to mention that?"

Shikamaru blinked. "What?"

Gaara shook his head and ran after Naruto. "Naruto, wait up!"

Shikamaru stared at their backs with a bored expression.

"Troublesome brothers."

* * *

Neji was obliterated.

The Hyuuga genius put up a good fight, but he suffered a phenomenon caused by the combination of his general bad luck and the unfortunate effects of his unfiltered mouth.

Naruto was already sulky over Gaara's not-tattoo even before he stepped into the arena.

Then, Neji had to bring up about fate and destinies and how Naruto would never be freed of the societal stigma against jinchuuriki no matter how much he wanted to help everyone, just like Neji would never be freed from his clan's backwards way of protecting themselves.

From sulky, Naruto grew angry.

Then, Neji brought up of how much of pathetic Hinata's crush to Naruto was, and how pathetic the girl's attempt trying to chase the shadows of the jinchuuriki brothers was.

Hinata wanted to be strong, and the brothers were the strongest in her batch.

She idolised them. She chased after their backs.

Naruto and Gaara were aware of that. That's why they trained harder despite being far stronger than genins their age. They knew that some of their classmates were looking at them as the closest source of inspiration to become better and stronger.

So, when Neji degraded her effort—along with other genins that have been doing the same as her—Naruto turned _livid._

"Do. Not. Degrade. My. Classmates."

He flared his chakra as an emphasis—the blue chakra, his own chakra and not Kurama's—as he glared down at the beaten genius.

"I don't care that you feel like you can't change your fate," Naruto growled, casting his gaze up to the audience's podium.

He fixed his gaze on Hinata. He sought for Kiba and Akamaru. His gaze lingered on Chouji. His eyes softened upon meeting Taiko's nervous gaze.

"They're trying to change _their_ fate," Naruto's voice was stern, a reminisces of Minato's Hokage voice. "Do not get in their way."

"They're weak," Neji spat from the crater he was lying in.

Naruto's chakra flared even more, now tinged with a hint of red.

"For now," he spat back, looking up to fix his gaze with Minato at the Hokage's podium.

Minato nodded encouragingly.

Naruto's smile grew fierce with determination.

"My classmates might be weak now," he said, addressing both Neji and the rest of the audience, his voice boomed in the silent arena. "But in the future…," he angled a fierce grin to the area among the audience where their classmates were waiting for his next words with baited breath.

He glanced down to glare at Neji.

"Years from now, once I become the Hokage," Naruto grinned with fierce determination. " _They_ are going to be my trusted swords and shields."

Neji was gobsmacked.

Gaara huffed. Pride brimmed from his person as he exchanged glances with Shikamaru.

"Advisors?" Gaara hummed, aware of the Nara's intelligence.

There was no way in hell Gaara was going solo to support Hokage Naruto as an advisor. Hell. He might end up as a supreme commander instead, serving in the frontlines and happily left Shikamaru to deal with the Hokage's Tower as Naruto's advisor.

"I guess," Shikamaru snorted but quirked a smile regardless. "Troublesome."

The silence went on for a few more minutes before the proctor finally regained the functionality of his gaping jaw;

"The winner is Uzumaki Naruto!"

Minato was the one who led the deafening applause.

* * *

Orochimaru is insane. Rasa is an idiot.

Honestly. These two should be powerful fighters with _decades_ of experience. Yet, they decided to team up and invade Konoha.

During the Finals of Chuunin Exam—when all strong shinobi of Konoha has gathered to watch the finals.

Idiots at their finest.

"You should have let their souls rest in peace," Gaara deadpanned, non-existent brows pinched near the marking on his forehead as he eyed his reanimated idol with utter distaste. "This is not the way I imagined meeting my idol."

That was the moment Gaara noticed a flicker of consciousness in Nidaime's blank eyes.

Gaara knew the Nidaime's works by heart. He has been reading and researching the Second's works since he encountered the term _Edo Tensei_. He was aware that the Nidaime has made a failsafe in all of his jutsu— _especially_ in this particular jutsu, in case someone tried to reanimate him in this exact predicament.

The reanimated corpses could break their contract with the summoner, provided that they have enough chakra to do so and enough freedom to weave the necessary hand signs.

Should the second requirement could not be met, there was a second failsafe that included a third party breaking the contract for the reanimated dead. This second failsafe existed as a backup for a backup.

"You idolised the Nidaime?" Orochimaru's raspy voice slithered through the eerie air of the barrier. "Then, it will be my pleasure to have you die in his hands."

Obviously, someone was still holding grudges over the incident in the Forest of Death.

Gaara didn't know what to feel when Orochimaru sent the Nidaime to go after him while the Shodai faced off against the combined force of Minato and Naruto. On one side, Gaara was excited because not many people would have the chance to fight against their long-deceased idol. On the other side, the Nidaime was reanimated as a tool, with suppressed chakra and personality that it made Gaara felt like he was fighting Kankurou's puppet instead.

Nidaime-sama is still so strong, though.

Drenched from head to toe, Gaara's sand armour cracked and disintegrated, leaving him with only the protection of Shukaku's blue shroud. He and Naruto both have yet to earn the complete bijuu transformation due to the limitation of their young bodies, but their current progress should be enough to defend Konoha against this invasion.

Though, he might not be a match to the former Hokage… _yet_.

The next attack happened so fast—and this was coming from Gaara, who grew up with a father that constantly abused the privilege of teleportation in their daily life.

Senju Tobirama was insanely _fast_.

The former Hokage was quick to seize the chance once Gaara's sand armour was gone, lunging for a swift blow. The Raijin no Ken grazed the red-haired boy's side, just enough to break the first layer of skin but it was enough proof that Tobirama's soul was fighting against Orochimaru's will. That blow could've killed Gaara if the reanimated Hokage didn't changed his angle at the last minute. The Nidaime was so close that Gaara's eyes were at the same level as his blank red eyes when Tobirama suddenly blinked—the former Hokage's consciousness flickered to life.

The confused red eyes flickered around the barrier before the Nidaime gritted his teeth in a pure wrathful rage.

"Jinchuuriki," Tobirama murmured, just loud enough for Gaara to hear. He drove his sword further, though this time it didn't even touch Gaara's body as he whispered to the red-haired boy; "Destroy me and my brother. Destroy us before we destroy Konoha."

Gaara smirked.

"How about no?"

Tobirama's brows twitched.

"I studied your works."

Elegant silver brows raised in surprise.

"I know how to break your contract with your summoner."

This time Tobirama was straight up frowning. "Do it, then."

"On one condition," Gaara hummed, letting his shoulders fell slack, muscles loosened as if he was dying from Tobirama's sword.

Tobirama frowned deeper.

Gaara grinned.

"Be my sensei."

* * *

Nidaime was _terrifying_.

And Gaara was in love.

He wasn't sure what kind of love he felt for the Second Hokage—whether it was the adoring love of a fan and future student, or his love has morphed to something else that would give Minato a heart attack to even think about—but Gaara didn't care.

Gaara was expecting to have a mere few hours being the Second's student, due to the eventual result of breaking the contract that will usually end with the disintegration of the reanimated bodies. Sure, it will take time as the process was proportionate to the strength of the reanimated person, but the disintegration would eventually happen.

Surprisingly, it didn't happen like that.

Gaara has infused his and Shukaku's chakra into the failsafe jutsu to free the Nidaime, only to realise that Orochimaru was not using a human's corpse to bring the Nidaime back. Whatever that he was using as the sacrifice to grant the former Hokage their reanimated bodies, the body cells were not that of a human but felt like it was something _else_ that was infused with the Shodai's chakra and DNA.

The reanimated body didn't disintegrate, but instead, it became _alive_.

The black of Tobirama's reanimated eyes turned to pure white.

The Nidaime is back—alive and kicking and violently _pissed off_.

Orochimaru didn't even stand a chance.

Tobirama dispelled the barrier as Minato, Naruto and the Shodai dealt with the Rogue Sannin—the two generations of idealistic idiots of the trio was attempting to talk Orochimaru out of his deranged vendetta while Minato smiled exasperatedly behind them. While the idiotic idealists did their thing, the Nidaime stood over the broken roof, looking over the various signs of battles all over the village.

"Jinchuuriki," the Nidaime called, turning around to look at Gaara. "Your name?"

"Namikaze Gaara," Gaara said, before promptly adding; "Nidaime-sama."

The corners of Tobirama's lips twitched.

"Sensei," the Second said. "Address me as 'sensei' when talking to me, boy."

Gaara choked on the air.

* * *

"You poor child!"

The sudden wail from the Shodai snapped Gaara from his fanboying choking as both he and his new sensei turned around, only to see Orochimaru being hugged to death by a teary-eyed Shodai. Tobirama's brows twitched upon seeing that sight, his lips curled to a scowl and he was all but stomped towards his elder brother.

"Anija!"

"Tobiiiiii," Hashirama wailed. "Let's adopt this poor child," he said, pulling the dying Orochimaru closer to his chest.

The 'what the fuck' was so loudly expressed on Tobirama's face that the Nidaime didn't even have to say it out loud.

Gaara levelled an unimpressed knowing look towards the beaming Naruto.

"So, it worked?" he asked, feeling like he was making the exact same expression as Tobirama now when Naruto grinned and gently patted Orochimaru's head.

"Yep~" Naruto giggled.

Gaara facepalmed.

" _What_ is working?" Tobirama snapped, sending an accusatory glare towards the blonde jinchuuriki.

" _Therapy no Jutsu_." The boys said in unison—Naruto said it with giddy pride while Gaara said it with utter exasperation.

Minato laughed sheepishly in the background.

Tobirama's face made a thing that made he looked like he was so close to exploding. Though, before he could yell at all of them—there was a loud crash, the roof opposite them was obliterated into dramatic clouds of dust as a looming figure stalked through the destruction with such a dramatic flair Gaara vaguely was reminded of Sasuke.

"HASHIRAMA!"

That was it.

Tobirama exploded.

"YOU REANIMATE MADARA?!"

Orochimaru whimpered to Hashirama's chest.

* * *

"Madara!" Hashirama beamed brightly, pink and yellow flowers sprouted by his feet.

Tobirama facepalmed.

Gaara honestly had a sense of deja vu upon seeing that. The dynamics were amusingly familiar.

"Hashirama!" Madara yelled, pointing his gunbai in the Shodai's direction. "I'll end you this time!"

"But, Madaaaraaa!" Hashirama whined. "We're friends!"

Madara sneered.

"We're like brothers!"

"My brothers are dead!" Madara yelled in a wrathful rage. He then shifted his glare towards the very unimpressed Tobirama. "You killed my last brother."

"It was _war_ , dumbass," Tobirama snorted. "Izuna was a victim of war."

"You killed him."

"What do you want me to do back then?" Tobirama sneered. "Put a flower crown on Izuna's head and have a tea party?" he deadpanned. " We. Were. At. War."

"YOU KILLED IZUNA!"

"Oh for fuck's sake. Just kiss already."

The annoyed loud voice halted the beginning of yet another epic fight between the founders. Gaara turned around just in time to see the arrival of the current Clan Head of the Uchiha and a strangely older Sasuke.

Madara gaped.

"And no, Senju," the older Sasuke huffed. "I'm against the flower crown and the tea party," he added, nodding in acknowledgement when Itachi excused himself to rejoin the other battles he must have left to escort this newcomer here. "Let's drink like men instead."

"IZUNA?"

Izuna closed his pitch-black eyes in resigned acceptance.

"Hey, Aniki. How're you doing?" he greeted, sarcasm dripping from each syllable. "Oh, wait. Don't answer that. You're being dramatic and idiotic as always, taking my spiteful attempt of ruining Tobirama's life using the combination of your dramatic chaos and Hashirama's idiocy way too seriously that you ended up wasting a perfectly good chance for peace."

That was a lungful of words. Gaara was impressed.

"You told me to not accept the peace!" Madara pointed an accusatory finger towards Izuna. "I'm just honouring your last wish!"

"Did you not hear me back then, Aniki?" Izuna yelled back. "I said ' _Never accept the peace if you want me to haunt you'._ "

Madara was stunned into a baffled silence.

"And no thanks to you, I was pulled from a perfectly pleasurable paradise when you did just that and caused me to be stuck by your side as a ghost."

"What."

"It was _hell_ ," Izuna ranted, seemingly like he has been keeping this in his chest for a long time. "You can't see me, but _I_ see you fucking up, ruining a perfectly good chance to mess with Tobirama's life when you could have pulled that emotionally constipated idiot into a kiss and become a legendary pair of the first peaceful shinobi village in history," he huffed, sending betrayed glares in Hashirama's direction.

" _Emotionally constipated_?" Tobirama hissed in disbelief.

Behind him, Gaara snickered.

"And I expect _you_ to notice, Hashirama. It was so painful watching my idiot of a brother waxing poetic and drama about his feelings to Tobirama while swearing vengeance on his own crush over my name," Izuna was completely on the roll now, directing his sharpest glare at Madara, lips curled to an annoyed scowl. "The vengeance I did not demand at that."

Madara choked.

Izuna leapt towards Madara and swatted the back of his brother's head harsh enough to make the legendary Uchiha stumbled forward.

" _My love sprung from my only hate_ , my ass," Izuna spat viciously.

Hashirama gaped in disbelief.

The faintest of pink coloured Tobirama's cheeks.

On the other hand, Gaara was dying from holding out laughter. Beside the Shodai, Naruto was in the same predicament—the blonde had it even worse, having to clamp a hand over his mouth, body trembling as he visibly struggled to not laugh.

The current generation had to wonder if they could relocate to the audience's podium so that they could watch the founders' drama from a much safer place but still enjoy the wonderful viewing experience.

Hashirama blinked, seemingly to finally be able to process the information when he _loudly_ blurted out;

"THE FEELING WAS MUTUAL?!"

Tobirama's ears reddened when Madara directed his confused gaze towards Hashirama.

"What is mutual?" the legendary Uchiha questioned.

"Tobirama has a cr—"

"SHUT UP, ANIJA!"

Izuna groaned.

Minato wisely herded his sons and the rest of his ANBU away from the bickering founders.

Some drama was better left unseen.

* * *

"Kurama and I are going to fight in the frontline with Tou-san, Hashi-jiji and Tobi-jiji," Naruto announced, Kurama's chakra encasing his body.

Gaara nodded, turning around to the other side of the village where he could see the glimmer of Rasa's gold dust shimmered underneath Konoha's sun.

After the founders re-joined them from their drama—both Tobirama and Madara were significantly flushed to the exact shade of Sakura's hair, while their respective brothers hunched together in conspiring smugness—they have regrouped to devise the strategy to counter the invasion force. Gaara and Naruto made quick works freeing the reanimated founders from their bounding contracts with Orochimaru, resulting them to be reborn as human again, just like Tobirama did when his reanimated body was infused with Shukaku's chakra.

It was then decided that they will use both of the former Hokage as the element of surprise against the invading forces in the frontlines. Izuna volunteered to guard Orochimaru all the way to the prison before helping Kankurou and Temari securing a safe route for the civilians to evacuate.

Madara, on the other hand, promptly headed to the Uchiha compound when Pakkun arrived to inform them that Kakashi and the three remaining Uchiha of the current generation were cornered by a whole clan of bloodline hunters that have joined the invasion force and reinforcement would be very much appreciated, thank you very much.

The legendary Uchiha was theatrically pissed off upon hearing the news.

Gaara winced upon seeing three different Susanoo loomed from said compound—two of them were recognisable as Obito's and Itachi's Susanoo. Though, the other one—the biggest one—was the most vicious.

That was one of the worst ways to go—at the receiving end of the wrath of three angry Uchiha.

The poor bloodline hunter's clan would have been extinct by the time the Uchiha was through with them.

As for Gaara, he needed to stop his sire.

To be honest, he was _terrified._ Despite knowing that he was no longer that helpless child Rasa has tried to suffocate multiple times, the idea to face off against his sire alone made him wary and scared.

Whenever Gaara had a nightmare, it was always of Rasa's cold eyes and the breathless pain of being suffocated by a cloud of heavy gold dust. The man has scarred him in so many ways that a father typically would not.

Naruto sensed Gaara's inner turmoil and promptly wrapped his arms around Gaara's body—Shukaku's blue mixed a bit with Kurama's red as the declared elder brother between the two attempted to sooth the younger.

"You might still be able to salvage it," Naruto murmured softly.

"He is a lost cause."

"So did Mada-jiji," Naruto countered with a wry grin, tipping his head in the direction of the largest Susanoo that was protecting the west line of the village. "But look at him now."

Gaara quirked a tiny smile.

"Go," Naruto encouraged, squeezing Gaara's hand tightly. "You're not alone," he said, infusing their chakra together, reminding Gaara that he has never been alone. "All three of us are here with you."

Gaara's smile turned to a genuine grin.

How could he ever forget that? He has always been in a two-man team ever since the day he was born.

 ** _"_** ** _Damn right, brat_** **,"** Shukaku purred.

Gaara huffed, smiling fondly.

"Damn right."

* * *

"You're an idiot," Gaara huffed, chakra gathering upon his fist. "And suicidal."

"You're a traitor," Rasa snarled, subduing his son's sand with complete ease. "And _weak_."

Shukaku's chakra flared.

 ** _"_** ** _I'll hold off his dust,"_** the bijuu said, voice void of the typical mocking tone. **_"Go show him how well Konoha raised you, brat."_**

Earthy sand clashed with golden dust when Gaara swung his fist onto the ground, knocking Rasa off balance as the ground collapsed beneath them. Before the Kazekage could react, Gaara launched a doton jutsu, attempting to skewer his sire from multiple different directions. The Kazekage was barely able to evade the multi-direction assaults.

"You know doton jutsu," Rasa mused.

"Sand is a limited resource in Konoha," Gaara deadpanned. "I have to adapt."

The Kazekage snarled and changed the battlefield high up in the sky. Gaara followed suit, using his sand as a platform. He didn't flinch, not a shift in his determined expression when tendrils of golden dust shot out to assault him.

The first tendril merely grazed and cracked his armour, but the second one pierced through his side, leaving a painful hole on his body.

What even was new.

Shukaku's chakra shroud naturally healed him, but Gaara couldn't stop his automated instinct to bring his hand to his wound, feeling the soothing relief of the green chakra of his healing jutsu.

The training with Tsunade has been gruelling and intense that sometimes Gaara forgot that Shukaku could heal him too.

"You know healing jutsu," Rasa mused again, looking more and more baffled.

"Tsuna-baachan is impossible to fend off," Gaara hummed fondly. "It is a useful branch of jutsu to learn, though."

Rasa gritted his teeth and launched yet another attack with what was left of his gold dust that was not restrained by Shukaku. His eyes widened in shock when his golden defence was broken through, as all that he could see afterwards was the determined face of his youngest son, the fiery will in those pale green eyes and the swirling perfect ball of chakra in the boy's hand.

He has seen that perfect ball of chakra only once, years ago, back during the first time he faced the Yellow Flash of Konoha in a battle.

His monstrous child knew the Yondaime Hokage's technique.

The boy lunged towards him, the powerful impact of the spiral ball of chakra was reduced by a layer of earthy sand but the pain was still blinding when it made contact with his body. Rasa was sent crashing onto the ground with force powerful enough to create a giant crater.

He was coughing up blood when a blot of red hair and pale skin came into his blurred view.

"That is the Yondaime Hokage's technique," Rasa wheezed, choking on his own blood.

"It is," Gaara acknowledged. "Tou-san taught me."

For some reasons, Rasa felt painfully betrayed hearing that.

The boy shuffled to kneel beside him. Rasa felt the weight of the boy's stare on him—pale green eyes were painfully young and filled with sadness as they met his blurry gaze—as if the boy was trying to look into his soul.

Rasa wondered what did Gaara see.

The Kazekage coughed again, the injuries he sustained from the bijuu-enhanced Rasengan was worst than he expected. He was completely at Gaara's mercy now and couldn't stop the wince when surprisingly gentle hands wiped the wetness that was trailing down his cheeks—oh, when did he start to cry?

Gaara hushed him softly, murmuring gentle words.

Then, relief. Relief washed over him like a loving embrace as he felt the waves of soothing chakra spread through his veins and eased up the pain. He blinked the remnants of his tears away, only to see his supposed youngest son hunched over him, glowing green hands pressed over Rasa's wounds.

"Who the hell are you?" Rasa asked desperately.

 _What have you done to my monstrous child?_ He left unsaid.

Gaara blinked and turned his gaze from the bleeding wound towards his sire.

In those pale green eyes, Rasa saw his child's eyes burnt with the same fiery spirit he saw in the Hokage's vibrant blue eyes.

 _You're supposed to be my child._

Something deep within him, a piece of him that was supposed to die along with Karura was jolted awake. That revived piece was now whimpering mournfully, howling in regret.

 _You're supposed to be_ _ **my**_ _child._

"I'm the Hokage's son."

Rasa didn't know why those words that slipped so fondly from his youngest child's mouth sent a stab of pain that twisted in his chest and left a vile taste in his throat.

Rasa wished that Gaara would just kill him right there.

* * *

 **A/N: One more chapter to go. Read and review, everyone~ Thank you!**

 **And please tell me that someone gets the line that Izuna quoted Madara. XD**


	22. Epilogue

The week after the failed invasion of Konoha was a chaos.

The revival of the founders was both something that was expected and unexpected from the madman Orochimaru has shown himself to be. It seemed poetic to reanimate the Shodai and Nidaime as the tool to destroy the very village they founded, thus it was not entirely surprising when the Snake Sannin did just that.

But to reanimate the infamous Uchiha brothers were something completely unexpected and took them all off-guard.

Which was the exact effect Orochimaru was aiming for just in case his control over the former Hokage was broken in some form of way or means. His plan was that everyone would be so dumbfounded upon seeing Madara and Izuna in the field that he could take out Yondaime—the current Hokage—in the midst of the confusion and terror.

Afterwards, he would leave the Uchiha to deal with the freed former Hokage, knowing that the Uchiha brothers would lust after Hashirama and Tobirama's second death—they wouldn't even care to free themselves from his Edo Tensei contract.

The Uchiha was his failsafe measure to counter the Shodai and Nidaime, should his plan to use the two as his tools go south.

Tobirama was so impressed with the plan he almost agreed with Hashirama's ridiculous pleading to adopt the Rogue Sannin.

He didn't. Because that was stupid—Orochimaru might deserve a chance because his motive was partly caused by Konoha's failing system, but prison and corrective time were necessary. If Obito has to endure it, so did Orochimaru.

Tobirama was not a soft-hearted romantic like his elder brother. Accept that fact.

Plus, Orochimaru made a huge miscalculation by not considering the Uchiha's love for their clan and forgot to consider what would happen if any of the reanimated Uchiha met their descendants.

The reanimated Izuna has instinctually gone to the Uchiha compound, drawn by the power of sharingan Itachi and Obito were displaying.

Thus, there went Orochimaru's backup plan to use the Uchiha brothers.

That plan went straight into the drain because the first person Izuna tried to kill was Itachi, who was among the few Uchiha that embraced Hashirama's will and was aware of the way to break the Edo Tensei bound.

Izuna hesitated and resisted against his bound upon recognising his own kin, and that was the moment Itachi freed his ancestor from the controlling bound of Edo Tensei.

Needless to say, the council meeting afterwards was highly entertaining.

In the end, an agreement has been achieved regarding the position of the revived founders among the new generation. Izuna took the responsibilities to assume the empty seat of Uchiha elders in the Hokage's council, giving his elder brother a chance of freedom from the dreaded paperwork. On the other hand, Hashirama declined the offer to take over the elder's position of the Senju clan from Tsunade but instead decided to take charge of the orphanage and lived an easy life of retirement—until the situation called him to interfere.

Madara chose the life of retirement too, assuming his long-forgotten passion for calligraphy and together with Hashirama, the original founders earned their living through Mokuton furniture and calligraphy decorative. Not that they needed to do that, but it was nice to earn money from their hobbies rather than having their income rolling in for simply being there as a symbol of Konoha.

If he was not indulging in his hobby, the Uchiha patriarch would be found at his dojo in the Uchiha compound, parting his knowledge to any interested children regardless of clan. He offered basic training to all children but selected his permanent disciples from those whose affinity was similar to Uchiha's common affinities—which are Fire and Lightning releases.

And if they passed his test, that is.

The founders have so much fun during the uproar Hyuuga Hinata has caused when she was the first to approach Uchiha Madara once the news that he was accepting disciples spread around town.

It was _priceless_. The Hyuuga was so pissed, Madara couldn't help but enjoy their rageful disbelief every time he walked around town and Hinata cheerfully greeted him as 'sensei'.

As for the Nidaime, he resumed what he started.

Tobirama literally took over the education system. No one dared to contest him when he combed through each of the syllabus and manpower—taking account all the prejudice that has been channeled to a certain clan or jinchuuriki—that only Iruka escaped the appraisal unscathed. Irked that the academy has not changed much from his era—which was unacceptable in his book because even _he_ knew that civilian children deserved a systematic education too and Konoha could do that now, considering that they were not low in funds like how it was during his time—the Nidaime revamped the whole system.

Thus, come the week that they called the 'Nidaime's Educational Rampage Week' of which the former Hokage dragged his new disciple around to personally ask the perceptive of the civilian and shinobi alike regarding the education system that they wish Konoha would conduct.

The result was the new branch of school for civilian children and a revamped syllabus for the shinobi children.

There was no way in hell Tobirama was going to let these children out doing actual mission when they don't even know enough chakra control to walk on a tree. It was not a demanding warring period like his time. They now could afford to train their children for quality instead of quantity.

The peace might not be absolute yet, but the village was prospering, the life expectancy of the shinobi has increased, and these children could afford more time to train before going out doing missions.

That's how Gaara spent his first week as the Nidaime's disciple.

He helped his sensei revamping the education system during the day—structuring the exams according to stages and levels, adding in basic nature affinity jutsu into the graduating class' curriculum, devising the educational plan and so much more.

Then, when they retire from the vicious planning, Gaara would have dinner with his sensei before proceeding with his lessons and training.

It was during one of these training that Tobirama dragged the skeleton out of Gaara's closet and displayed it in a glass case like the mad scientist he was.

"I noticed that you haven't visited him."

Gaara halted in the middle of his cooling-down kata, feeling the gaze of his new sensei burnt on his back. Tobirama may look like a block of ice—what with his colour scheme and cold attitude—but the revived Hokage was actually a smouldering fire. The heat he gave off didn't flare dramatically like that of Uchiha Madara nor did it burn brightly like his elder brother, but it burnt in silence yet hot all the same.

So, to be at the receiving end of that burning gaze was not something that Gaara could shrug off easily.

"It is not…," Gaara said, exhaling a deep breath. "… _appropriate_."

"To visit your own father is inappropriate?"

Crap. Gaara could _hear_ Tobirama's displeased frown in those words.

"It is _complicated_."

"Boy," Tobirama called, and this time, Gaara could hear the amused snort in his controlled voice. "I'm supposed to be dead decades ago but here I am, very much alive and—"

"—engaged to your sworn enemy," Gaara cut his words, stifling a nervous giggle as he turned around to face his sensei. "Yes, sensei. I guess your situation is much more _complicated_ than mine."

Red eyes narrowed in amused displeased.

"Brat," Tobirama finally spat, though there was no heat in voice.

Tobirama almost sounded humoured, red eyes lit up with a mischievousness that Gaara often saw in Tsunade's eyes whenever he pissed her off and the Sannin was planning a petty revenge.

Wait. Those two were related.

"Crap," Gaara mouthed the exact same time twin water dragons swallowed him whole.

Tobirama only dispelled the dragons when Gaara was shivering to the bone and the water has significantly weighed down his sand armour. Gaara frowned and let his armour disintegrated onto the ground, now was questioning his own decision to request apprenticeship with this man, despite the Sandaime's not-very-subtle warnings that Tobirama was a mildly sadistic teacher.

"Sandaime is right," Gaara muttered, wringing his drenched shirt. "You're mildly sadistic."

Tobirama snorted.

"You should visit him," the former Hokage said sternly, making it sound like an order rather than a suggestion. "Free your heart from your emotional turmoil before we begin our training journey."

"I don't know that you're the sentimental philosophical type, sensei," Gaara mused.

"Boy."

Gaara squeezed his eyes shut upon hearing the stern words. Tobirama was not letting Gaara keep _this_ particular skeleton in his closet.

"I'll try…," he agreed reluctantly.

Gaara vehemently wished that the Suna shinobi was still wary of him to let him into the Kazekage's ward.

Moreover, it was his bijuu-enhanced Rasengan that landed the man in such condition in the first place.

"Good," Tobirama huffed, reaching out a hand to grasp the collar of Gaara's drenched shirt.

"Eh?"

"Let's go now."

"But it is not the visiting hours!" Gaara struggled futilely. "It's already late!"

Tobirama levelled him a _look_ and Gaara promptly winced at the unspoken ' _Are you fucking kidding me?_ ' .

Gaara cursed Minato's fondness on regaling the tale of his children to anyone who was willing to listen—in recent week, it was Hashirama, with Madara and Tobirama forcefully dragged into the session by the Shodai.

"The Kazekage just woke up this afternoon," Tobirama stated, tightening his hold on Gaara before he teleported them directly in front of the Kazekage's room, startling the guards at the door. "I have been told that he is lucid enough for civil conversation now," he turned to look at Gaara, tipping his head to the closed door with an expectant look.

Gaara hated his new sensei. He would rather have the deranged bipolar Obito back as his sensei, thank you very much. At least Obito didn't force his way into his students' personal business.

But said one-eyed sensei was off on an extended 'vacation' with another one-eyed sensei, so regretfully, Gaara was stuck with the nosy Tobirama.

"Sensei…," Gaara attempted to plead.

Tobirama was unyielding.

"Go."

The former Hokage opened the closed door, tipping his head again as a silent order for the boy to enter the room.

Gaara shook his head vehemently.

Tobirama's brows twitched.

"Talk. To. Him." The Nidaime spat viciously.

He was then pushed inside as the door slammed behind him.

Gaara didn't even dare to move when he felt the weight of Rasa's stare on him.

"I wasn't sure that you would ever come."

The Kazekage's voice was raspy and weak—sounding like he has spent hours yelling and crying instead of being in a coma—but when Gaara looked up to meet his gaze, the man's face was void of any emotions. They held a staring match for what it felt like an eternity before Rasa deflated. The man let out a long heavy breath, throwing his arm over his eyes, his throat visibly bobbed as if he was swallowing something unpleasant.

"Temari and Kankurou didn't visit," the Kazekage rasped.

"They might be busy," Gaara supplied, wondering if no one remembered to notify his blood siblings regarding the Kazekage's improving state. "They're trying to maintain the alliance between you and us."

Something shifted in Rasa's face. His teeth gritted tight and the tension returned to his face. Though, it wasn't for long. Rasa deflated again, muscles loose and slack—the most relaxed he has ever been in Gaara's presence. When he opened his mouth again, the wheezing laugh that came out was bitter and mournful.

"I get what I deserve, huh?"

Every molecule in Gaara's body screamed affirmative to that rhetorical question.

But, he remained silent.

"I cast you away, and now the rest of my children cast _me_ away."

Gaara held back a wince at that accusation.

"You've grown, Gaara."

Gaara's head snapped up at the unexpected comment. He frowned, reasonably baffled at the bizarre softness on his sire's face. Rasa looked different without the hard edges of hatred on his face, the creases of his age were more prominent now and he looked completely resigned to a defeat.

"Your mother's will has lived on within you," the Kazekage admitted, shifting his weary gaze to meet Gaara's eyes. "Isn't that right, Shukaku?"

Gaara has that split second of warning when Shukaku took over his body.

"Took you long enough to notice, brat," the one-tailed bijuu huffed, using Gaara as a mouthpiece.

Rasa didn't show any surprise though. The Kazekage merely stared into the jinchuuriki's eyes, as if looking for the pale green of his son's behind Shukaku's eyes.

"She lives, accommodating to his wants and needs. She protects when he needs it and allows him to learn to fend for himself when it is necessary," Shukaku purred, sounding almost soft. "But Karura never leaves," the bijuu then snorted a laugh. "And neither does Kushina," Shukaku shook Gaara's head, his amusement was evident.

"These great mothers never leave their children."

Gaara gasped for air when he was pushed back to reign control his body, confusion filled his mind.

What the hell did Shukaku mean?

"Mothers are so powerful indeed," Rasa murmured, eyes softened. "And all I did as a father was to go against your mother's will and torment you," he fixed his gaze on the white blanket, fists clenching on the fabric. "You're never a failed experiment."

Gaara didn't know how to react upon seeing droplets of tears that wetted the white fabric.

"I'm the one who is a failed father," Rasa rasped, voice hoarse and pained. "Forgive me."

Just like that, the dam broke and Gaara wept.

"Thank you," Gaara murmured, not knowing why he thanked this man.

But he was grateful for this relief regardless.

* * *

When Gaara finally walked out of the Kazekage's ward, he was greeted with a smirking Tobirama.

"Better?" the Nidaime asked, his facial expression softened just by the slightest bit.

Gaara didn't answer. Instead, he lunged forward and captured the revived Hokage into a hug—hard-edged armour and all—and burrowed his face to the hard breastplate, completely pleased when there was a hesitant hand patting the top of his head.

"Thank you, sensei."

Tobirama huffed and quirked the tiniest of a smile.

"Brat."

* * *

Gaara was packing his travel pack when he felt the call to the Bijuu Psyche Plane.

He was going to leave Konoha for a training journey tomorrow, and to be honest, he was excited at the prospect of travelling outside of the gates of the village. He was supposed to experience the diverse culture of shinobi world and forge positive bonds with other shinobi outside of his circle, but the idea of spending a whole two years training with the Nidaime was equally exciting too.

Shukaku was silent throughout the whole time Tobirama suggested this, so Gaara has no idea what the bijuu thought of this training journey.

Thus, Gaara heeded to the call, allowing his consciousness to be spirited away to the special mindscape that was only accessible when the bijuu allowed them in.

Imagine his surprise when he saw Naruto in the mindscape too.

"Naruto?!"

"Eh, you too?" Naruto was equally surprised as Gaara was before the blonde gathered his wits back and turned around to face Kurama, pointing one accusatory finger at the fox. "Oi, Kurama! What is the meaning of this?"

"Keh," Kurama huffed, smirking. "A gift."

"What?" Naruto blinked stupidly, lowering his hand.

"A gift," Shukaku repeated, lowering his body so that he rested on his paws instead, his eyes stared at Gaara with a strange hint of fondness. "Consider it as a thank-you gift for being a tolerable brat all these years."

"What?" Gaara parroted Naruto, honestly confused.

"Gaara." "Naruto."

Both boys turned around the moment they heard their name been called and promptly froze on the spot.

This time, the tears flowed without resistance, because both jinchuuriki just _knew_ that these women were _real._

It took another second for both of them to launch themselves to the waiting arms of their mothers.

Naruto sobbed loudly, commencing his ugly cry without shame as he buried his face to Kushina's chest, letting the red-haired women cooed and showered him with loving kisses.

Gaara was more silent, but his grip on Karura's body was tight as he greedily fed on his mother's laughter, indulging in the love and joy that she openly showered him with.

"My perfect little boy, all grown up," Karura whispered in between kisses. "I'm so proud of you," she said, leaning down to plant a kiss on his forehead.

"I wasn't lying earlier," Shukaku purred from the background, this time the fondness was obvious in his voice. "These great mothers never left."

Kurama huffed in agreement.

Gaara laughed and nodded in understanding, not even releasing his embrace on his mother.

Finally. Finally. Gaara is _finally_ complete.

 **THE END**

* * *

 **A/N: Finally...it ends! God, this was supposed to be an 8k one-shot. Look at how long it ended up!**

 **I had fun weaving the founders into the epilogue! And if it wasn't clear in this epilogue, here is what happened during the invasion. Orochimaru prepared Madara and Izuna to be automatically reanimated once he lost control on either one or both of the Shodai or Nidaime Hokage. Gaara freed Tobirama, hence triggering for Madara and Izuna to be reanimated. _(Because, let's be honest. No one in Orochimaru's invasion force could take either one of the Hokage and wins. He needed the Uchiha brothers if he lost control of the Hokage.)_**

 **Anyway, this has been a wonderful journey. Hope you enjoy this story!**

 **P/s: And if you do enjoy it, don't forget to leave a comment~!**


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